§ MR. SCHWANNI beg to ask the Postmaster-General whether he is aware that, although successive Postmasters-General in dealing with the salaries of telegraphists have stated that telegraphists receive a number of appointments on the engineering staff and official witnesses made the same statement before the Wages Commission, the Civil Service Commission now state that for the position of a second - class engineer it is necessary that a candidate should have 1244 at least two years training, either in a suitable workshop attached to a college or University or under a firm of electrical or mechanical engineers of good standing; whether he can state the date upon which he was acquainted with this alteration; and whether, in view of the fact that no telegraphists can now secure these positions, he is prepared to consider some arrangements for compensating them for loss of these appointments promised to them by the Department.
LORD STANLEYThe hon. Member appears to be under a misapprehension. The recent decision to throw open a small proportion (at present one-fourth) of the appointments as second-class engineer to public competition does not exclude telegraphists from promotion to the class through the classes of junior clerks in the engineering department and sub-engineers as at present. I approved the scheme regulating the conditions of admission to the competition, after consultation with the Civil Service Commissioners on the 16th ultimo.