§ SIR COLMAN O'LOGHLENasked the Postmaster General, If he would state under what Statute the Post Office claims to have the right to render compulsory the pre-payment of letters from the United Kingdom to our Australian Colonies; under what Statute letters from the United Kingdom to our Australian Colonies, posted in the United Kingdom with no stamp, or with an insufficient stamp, are now opened and 1234 read at the General Post Office; if he can lay upon the Table of the House a Return, for each of the last three years, of the number of such letters opened and read at the General Post Office; and, if he can state on what grounds the senders of letters from the United Kingdom to our Australian Colonies have not the same option of pre-paying or not those letters as they now possess with regard to letters between different parts of the United Kingdom?
§ LORD JOHN MANNERS,in reply, said, the Treasury Warrant of 1864, which rendered compulsory the prepayment of letters from the United Kingdom to the Australian Colonies was issued under the 3 & 4 Vict. c. 96. Under the same statute letters from the United Kingdom to the Australian Colonies with no stamp or an insufficient stamp were opened, and not read, but returned to the writers of them. No Return had been kept of the number of such letters opened and returned. Compulsory pre-payment was agreed upon between the Imperial Government and the Governments of the several Australian Colonies as long ago as 1865. A few years ago the Imperial Government made a proposal to the Australian Government to relax that rule, but no further steps were taken in the matter.