§ SIR ALBERT ROLL1T (Islington, S.)I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether he feels able to relax the rule prohibiting meetings of Post Office officials being attended by those who are not employed in the Post Office in the case of the annual meeting of the Fawcett Association on Wednesday next, so far as regards the Chairman and Secretary of the Association?
MR. KEIR-HARDIE (West Ham, S.)At the same time, I will ask the Postmaster General whether he has received applications from the officials of the Fawcett Association, or the officials of any of the branches of the said Association, for leave to attend the annual meeting of the Fawcett Association on Wednesday next; and whether such applications have been refused; and, if so, what were the reasons for such refusal?
§ MR. A. MORLEYPrior to the year 1890 sorters and postmen were prohibited from holding meetings beyond the walls of the Post Office building for the discussion of official questions. In that year this prohibition, which dated from 1866. was withdrawn, and such meetings were allowed to be held subject to certain conditions, of which one is that the meetings are to be confined to Post Office servants, and to those Post Office servants only Who are directly interested in the matter or matters to be discussed. No exception to this rule has been made, and I should not feel justified in making one in favour of two men who were dismissed by my predecessor for acts of insubordination and defiance, which, in his opinion, were subversive or all discipline.