§ MR. SAMPSON LLOYDasked the First Lord of the Admiralty, How it is intended to apply the estimated sum of £12,634, stated (in Parliamentary Paper, No. 106, of 14th March 1877) to be the cost of the proposed establishment of 100 chief engine-room artificers in the Royal Navy; and, whether that sum represents the estimated future pay of 100 men of the said new rating some four or five years hence, when the scheme shall be fully developed, or the pay of the said men next year; and, if the latter (inasmuch as until June 1878 no engine-room artificer can have qualified himself for the higher rating by ten years' service), it is intended to promote at once to the higher rating and pay 100 engine-room artificers who have not served ten years, or, if not, how the estimate of £12,634 is accounted for?
§ MR. HUNT,in reply, said, that the estimated sum referred to was intended to provide for the ultimate cost of the new rating. The sum taken in next year's Estimates was something under £6,000 for that purpose, and it was proposed almost immediately to promote 50 artificers to the new rating, notwithstanding that they had not completed their 10 years' service. In the course of a short time, after the 10 years' service of other artificers had been completed, he hoped that a considerable number would be added to the rating.