§ MR. HUNTsaid, he wished to ask the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether it is the intention of the Secretary of State to create a sub-department of the Financial Department of the India Office, to be called "The Funds Branch," to be presided over by an Assistant Secretary; and, it so, whether it is true that it is in contemplation to appoint to that office a second class clerk from another Government Department, and to pass over the whole of the senior clerks in the India Office, whose term of service varies from thirty-six years to eleven.
§ MR. STANSFELDreplied, that it was in the contemplation of his noble Friend the Secretary of State for India to create either a sub-department under the Financial Secretary, or a distinct branch to undertake the management of certain funds, for the transfer of which a Rill had passed that House, and would, he hoped, be read in the other House of Parliament a second time that evening. The new Department could not, however, be created without an Order in Council, nor could the Order in Council be issued until the Bill to which he referred had passed into law. The Secretary of State, when the Order in Council had been obtained, and not until then, would be ready to take into consideration the relative fitness of the various gentlemen whose names might be proposed to him to fill the position of head of the Department.