§ MR. SUMMERBELLI beg to ask the First Commissioner of Works if he is aware that policemen doing park duty receive 35s. per week, and also the usual allowance of 2s. 10d. per week for rent and fuel, making in all 37s. 10d. per week, whereas the park-keepers in Kensington Gardens, Regent's, St. James's and Greenwich Parks only receive 26s. per week, although they have to perform the same duties as the police, and, if so, if he will favourably consider the claims of these men with a view to some increase in their pay, especially in view of the great saving effected in the past twenty years by the gradual transference of regular police work to the park-keepers.
§ THE FIRST COMMISSIONER OF WORKS (MR. HARCOURT, Lancashire, Rossendale)No doubt the Metropolitan Police employed in the Royal Parks receive a higher rate of pay than the park-keepers; but I am not able to admit the comparison. The police are on service at an earlier period of life than the park-keepers, who enter on their duty not much before the time that the police take their discharge, and are retained to a much later age. They have also (in many cases) the prospect of promotion to a lodge.