§ Mr. GEORGE YOUNGERasked the Postmaster-General whether there is a regulation to the effect that Post Office telegraphists engaged on newspaper wires should not be withdrawn during the Parliamentary Session; whether he was aware that two of these men were recently withdrawn from that duty and have only been sent back till the beginning of the Spring Recess, as the result of a protest from the newspapers concerned; and whether it could be arranged that such telegraphists should only be replaced at the end of the year?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThe rule is that telegraphists shall be detailed for service in newspaper offices for three years only, and it is now always arranged that the time of relief should fall outside the Parliamentary Session. In the cases of some of the older men, however, the date of relief falls inside the Session, and in. such cases, if good reason is shown, the change is deferred until the next Recess or until the end of the Session.