§ MR. NANNETTI (Dublin, College Green)To ask the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that two second division clerks have applied for clerkships in the office of the Controller, Sorting Office, General Post Office, Dublin, and whether it is intended to accede to their request; and whether, seeing that these positions have hitherto been considered to be confined to the sorting clerks and telegraphists attached to the sorting office, and that the majority of these officers, though eligible for promotion in their own department, are practically debarred from the positions held by the second division clerk, he will consider the advisability of confining the positions in question to the officials of the sorting department.
(Answered by Mr. Austen Chamberlain.) Yes; one applied in the year 1900 and one last year, but the vacancies were filled by the promotion of sorting clerks and telegraphists. I can make no promise, but I do not anticipate having to go outside the sorting office to fill any clerkships in that office in the near future.