HC Deb 02 April 1908 vol 187 cc647-8
MR. FIELD (Dublin, St. Patrick)

To ask the Postmaster-General whether he will state the respective numbers of women clerks from each branch of the Post Office in London whose names are noted as desiring transfer to Dublin; and seeing that junior members of such clerks, to the exclusion of their seniors, are about to be transferred to Dublin, will he say whether all future transfers will be regulated according to seniority and equality of efficiency.

(Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) The total number of women clerks who have applied for transfer to Dublin is fifty-eight, of whom eighteen are employed in the Accountant-General's Department, twenty-nine in the Savings Bank, and eleven in the Money Order Department. Priority of application is the governing factor in the case of transfers.

MR. FIELD

To ask the Postmaster-General whether, seeing that a number of Savings Bank women clerks were asked by the Savings Bank authorities, either privately or officially, sometime before the present Government came into office, if they would serve in Dublin, that the percentages of Irish deposits and withdrawals made through British deposit hooks and vice versa, as worked out by the Savings Bank, either privately or officially, show only one per cent. approximately on the totals, that, apart from the enormous inconvenience to Irish depositors, Ireland loses £30,000 per annum by having the Irish Savings Bank accounts kept in London, that 99 per cent. of the manufactured stuff used in the Post Office in Ireland is not manufactured in Ireland, that clerical work can be as efficiently, and, having regard to the cost of housing accommodation, more economically performed in Dublin than in London, and that it would be more in conformity with Irish ideas if the Irish Savings Bank accounts were kept in Dublin, he will further consider the advisability of transferring the work of keeping these accounts from London to Dublin.

(Answered by Mr. Sydney Buxton.) I am afraid I have nothing to add to the replies I gave my hon. friend on the subject last session.