§ MR. YOXALLI beg to ask the President of the Local Government Board whether a clerical assistant with about two years service has been appointed, without examination, assistant laboratory clerk at the Local Government Board at a salary of £120 per annum, rising by annual increments of £5 to £200 per annum; and whether, seeing that there are serving in the Local Government Board twenty-one senior assistant clerks with a service of from fifteen to twenty-seven years, who are only receiving an increment of £2 10s., rising only to a maximum of £150 per annum, and that the appointment referred to does not entail the possession of special technical qualifications, it could have been offered, as some encouragement, to one of the deserving senior assistant clerks in that Department.
§ MR. CHAPLINAs regards the first paragraph the answer is in the negative. In reply to the second paragraph—the appointment, no doubt, could have been offered to any one I selected, but the clerk in question was chosen because he had been employed in the laboratory for some time past, and strong representations were made as to his special fitness for the post by those who were best acquainted with his work and capabilities.