MR. F. A O'KEEFFE (Limerick)I beg to ask the Postmaster General whether the rule of the Postal Telegraph Service, that second-class officers, transferred from one office to another, are placed at the bottom of their class in the office to which they are transferred, has always been rigidly enforced, and if he would explain why it has been departed from in the case of the second-class officer recently transferred from Killarney to Limerick, he having been placed over the heads of the second-class staff, by being promoted to a first-class appointment, and how the plea of exchange is sustained, seeing that both officers held different positions in their respective offices; whether it is a fact that, owing to this system, only one local second-class officer has been promoted in the Limerick Telegraph Department within the past six years; and, will he cause further inquiry to be made into the whole treatment meted out to the second-class staff at Limerick?
§ MR. ARNOLD MORLEYYes, Sir; it is the general practice when an officer is transferred from one office to another that he enters the class to which he is transferred at the bottom. As I informed the hon. Member, the exchange of officers between Limerick and Killarney was made in the interests of the Service. If the staff at either office has anything to complain of, and will bring 777 forward the subject; of their complaint through the prescribed official channel, I will undertake that it shall be carefully inquired into and considered, and if the hon. Member cares to call at the General Post Office I will arrange that an officer of the Department shall put him in possession of all the facts.