§ DR. LUSHasked the Postmaster General, If the rule understood to prevail in the General Post Office, whereby all offices and country postmasterships exceeding one hundred pounds in annual value were reserved by open competition for the promotion of deserving clerks and officers in the Post Office still exists; and, if so, if he will state to the House the circumstances under which the recent appointments to the postmasterships of Andover, Blandford, and Chichester were made in apparent disregard of that rule?
§ LORD JOHN MANNERS, in reply, said, the rule that postmasterships worth more than £120 a-year—not £100 a-year, as supposed by the hon. Member—should be filled by means of open competition among the clerks and other officers of the Department was still in force. The postmasterships at Andover and Blandford, mentioned in the Question, did not come under that rule, their value being under £120. To the Post Office at Chichester, he had appointed an officer who was not only well qualified and strongly recommended by the district surveyor, but who for some time had acted as postmaster. It might be well to add that a memorial signed virtually by the whole town was presented in favour of the person whom he had selected.