MR. LAWSONI beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Depart- 355 ment whether any storekeeper or clerk serving in Her Majesty's prisons was called upon by him, or the Committee of Inquiry appointed by him, to give evidence or to be examined upon the question of the pay and status of the clerical establishment in connection with those prisons?
§ MR. MATTHEWSI referred the question of the pay and status of the prison clerks to a Committee of Accounts, which had originally fixed the establishment, pay, and duties of these officials, and not to the Committee of Inquiry appointed with reference to prison warders. The Committee of Accounts, consisting of a Director of Prisons, an Inspector of Prisons, and a Treasury officer, who had himself been in the Prison Service, had such familiarity with the subject that they did not think it necessary to call any clerk or storekeeper as witnesses.