§ MR. H. C. STEPHENS (Middlesex, Hornsey)I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster General, having regard to his intimation that the payment of £2,500 in connection with the Post Office could be freed from the condition attached, that the said sum is to be devoted to the scheme for acquiring as an open space certain vacant land in Little Britain adjoining the existing public garden in the parish of St. Botolph, Aldgate, in what manner, and with whom, he will carry on such a negotiation; and whether he is aware that the citizens and others who have worked for a long period to free this space, and have collected subscriptions amounting to over £3,600, have throughout depended upon this contract being observed in good faith?
§ MR. HANBURYThe Treasury sanctioned the sale of the land in Cheapside, and the application of the purchase money to the purposes of the Postmen's Park on the understanding that the Post Office should cease to pay a sum of £100 hitherto paid to the City Parochial Trustees, and should, on the other hand, receive from the Trustees £100 a year formerly paid by them to the Vicar and Churchwardens 487 of St. Botolph. Both these conditions have now fallen through, as the City Parochial Trustees—not unnaturally, I think—object to any arrangement which would throw the cost of the maintenance of the garden on to the ratepayers. This means that the maintenance would have to be undertaken out of public funds, involving a capitalised cost of £6,000. This is a wholly unreasonable additional amount to contribute. I have no doubt that it will be possible to come to an arrangement for the payment of the sum in question, which already stands in the joint names of officers of the Corporation and the Postmaster General. I am aware that considerable subscriptions have been raised, which, however, can, one of the Churchwardens states, be returned intact. The Treasury are still prepared to carry out their original contract, but they are not prepared to add to it a further offer of £6,000.