MR. GEORGE RUSSELLasked the Postmaster General, Whether it is practicable to extend the advantages of the Post Office Savings Bank system, by opening branch savings banks, under the control of the Department, at large factories, when and where wages are being paid, as similar arrangements, even in private hands, have been found to encourage thrift?
§ MR. FAWCETTSir, the best way in which I can answer the Question of my hon. Friend is to refer to a circumstance which I have the permission of my hon. Friend the Member for East Staffordshire (Mr. M. A. Bass) to mention—namely, that a few weeks since he placed in my hands a proposal from Mr. Clay, a partner in the firm of Messrs. Bass, that a clerk should be sent from the Burton post-office once or twice a week to their brewery, when the wages of the workmen were being paid, with the object of opening on the premises a Post Office Savings Bank, Messrs. Bass at the same time undertaking to defray all the expenses to which the Department might be put. I at once gave most cordial assent to the proposal, and it has now been in operation for some weeks. I can only say that, under the same conditions, I shall be very pleased to make similar arrangements with other firms, so far as the resources of the local post-offices will permit.