§ Mr. HUDSONasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will consider the advisability of granting a substantial increase of pay to prison officers, as their salary has remained nearly stationary during the past fifteen years, and has now become inadequate owing to the rise in the prices of food commodities in recent years?
§ The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. McKenna)I am now considering certain special cases brought to my notice by the Prison Commissioners; but I think the question of a general rise of wages on account of the rise of the prices must wait the result of the investigations into the cost of living undertaken by the Board of Trade.
§ Mr. HUDSONfurther asked the Home Secretary whether prison warders work thirty-nine days per year more than the police, while their duties are more onerous and exacting; and will he consider the desirability of conceding to prison officails the eight-hour day?
§ Mr. McKENNAIt is not possible to institute any satisfactory comparison between the duties of the police1 and of prison warders. The fact that the police constable is chiefly employed in night duty in the streets exposed for long hours to every sort of weather alone makes a wide difference between the two employments. But it is certainly not the case that prison warders work thirty-nine days a year more than the police. I have now, however, under my consideration the question whether it is possible to reduce materially the hours of prison warders.
§ Mr. HUDSONlikewise asked the Home Secretary whether discontent exists in His Majesty's prison service in consequence of the continued neglect of the Prison Commissioners, who persist in ignoring the requests of the warders to be allowed certain modifications in their conditions of service; and will he now take the necessary steps for giving effect to the appeals made in their many petitions?
§ Mr. McKENNAThere is not the slightest ground for the suggestion that the Prison Commissioners have neglected the applications made to them by the prison warders. On the contrary, they have been devoting much time and care to reviewing the conditions of service with the object of meeting the wishes of the warders so far as possible without loss of 516 efficiency or unreasonable expenditure. The warders' petitions have now been submitted to me, and they shall receive my best consideration. I may remind the hon. Member that on more than one occasion the Prison Commissioners have recommended improvements in the conditions of service without waiting for any application from the warders.