§ MR. ERNEST GRAY (West Ham, N.)I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, whether the normal attendance of counter clerks and telegraphists is eight hours per day; whether it is a practice to arrange the duties so that clerks perform ten hours' work on one day, receiving as compensation a six hour duty the following day; whether men in the Eastern District are sent on annual leave upon the completion of a day of ten hours' duty, 216 and in several instances are compelled to perform a duty of similar length on the day of their return without any equivalent being granted for the extra attendance; and whether the Postmaster General will authorise the discontinuance of this custom, thereby placing the Eastern District clerks in the same position as the staffs employed throughout the remainder of London?
§ THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. R. W. HANBURY,) PrestonThe normal attendance of counter clerks and telegraphists is 48 hours a week. It is not unusual to allow the counter clerks and telegraphists to have long and short duties of 10 hours and 6 hours respectively on alternate days. If men go on annual leave the day after they have done 10 hours' duty, and the leave lasts for an odd number of days, they have on the day of their return had to work in the Eastern District 10 hours, and similarly if they worked a short duty of 6 hours the day before going away for an odd number of days, they would on the day of return work 6 hours. In the case of counter clerks and telegraphists in the Eastern Central District allowance is made for any excess over 48 hours in 6 days when two long duties occur, one the day before leaving and one the day of return, and likewise officers have to make up the deficiency when two short duties have been done in the same way. This seems a reasonable practice, and it will be adopted in future in all the districts.