§ MR. DILLON (Mayo, E.)I beg to ask the Secretary to the Treasury, as representing the Postmaster-General, whether he is aware that at Fintona, the largest town in the South Tyrone Parliamentary division of county Tyrone, the mails on Sunday mornings are seldom delivered before 10 a.m., though they have been lying at Omagh, six miles distant, from 3 a.m., whence they are conveyed by a horse and trap; and if there is any reason to prevent their delivery a little earlier, so as to enable persons obliged to leave Fintona by the only Sunday train at 9 a.m. to receive their letters 1489 before leaving; and, seeing that the only mail from Fintona on Sundays is made up about 4.30 p.m. and sent to head office at Omagh, where it lies untouched till about 10 p.m., whether there is anything to prevent its being dispatched later on Sundays, say at 7 or 8 p.m.
§ THE FINANCIAL SECRETARY TO THE TREASURY (Mr. HANBURY, Preston)The mails are due at Fintona on Sunday about 9 a.m., and the delivery commences at 9.15 a.m. On weekdays the service to Fintona is by train, but on Sunday no trains are run, and the mails are conveyed by a walking postman, leaving Omagh, where they have been lying, as the hon. Member presumes, for some hours, at 6 a.m. This is the usual hour of departure for rural postmen. The Sunday dispatch from Fintona is at 5.10 p.m. As a rule rural postmen are allowed to return from the terminal point of their journeys on Sundays in the forenoon about one hour after the completion of the delivery. As this postman waits eight hours, the inhabitants of Fintona have the advantage of an exceptionally late despatch.
§ MR. DILLONMy information is that the mails are conveyed by horse and trap. Cannot the right hon. Gentleman, bearing in mind the importance of this district, expedite matters a bit?
§ MR. HANBURYwas understood to reply in the negative.