Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTasked the Postmaster-General whether his attention has been called to a letter from the Assistant Postmaster-General to the hon. Member for the Northern Division of Norfolk, dated 30th December, 1911, stating that the Hobhouse Committee must be understood to have fixed the scale of salaries for the women clerks in the Post Office in respect of their average work; whether these women clerks have recently had certain of the simpler clerical or quasi-clerical duties hitherto performed by them taken away from them and assigned to a new class of assistant women clerks in the money order department; and, if so, whether, in view of the fact that by taking away the simpler duties he has raised the average character of their work, he will now consider the advisability of raising their salaries in accordance with the principle on which the Hobhouse Committee fixed their scale of salaries?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELYes, Sir, I am aware of the Assistant Postmaster-General's letter. The elementary duties were not distributed among the women clerks as a whole, and did not affect the average quality of the work of most of them. These duties have been transferred from a few women clerks, and no doubt the average quality of the work of these few has been improved. But I cannot see that this raises any question of improving the scale of salary of the class as a whole; the few women relieved of the elementary duties are only doing the same work now as their colleagues did in the past.
Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTIs it not a fact that the work which these women have been doing in the past has now been heightened in quality and difficulty; and if their salaries were fixed by the Hobhouse Committee in respect of the previous quality of their work, does he not think it is desirable that the salaries of these women should be raised?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThe work is not being paid for at a lower scale than was recommended by the Hobhouse Committee.
§ Mr. LANSBURYIs the right hon. Gentleman aware that the "few" persons whose work is affected by this really number hundreds, and that it is now proposed to give the work to hundreds of women who are paid not on the higher but the lower scale?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELI have already said that I am not prepared to make any change on a large scale until the Select Committee has examined into the question and expressed their opinion on the matter.
§ Mr. WARDLEDoes the right hon. Gentleman say it is not a fact that a lower scale of wages than was fixed by the Hobhouse Committee is being paid?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELYes, Sir.
§ Mr. LANSBURYIn the case of assistant women clerks?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThe class of assistant women clerks does not exist. The work which is now being done by the women clerks' class is being paid for on the scale recommended by the Hobhouse Committee, and no women clerks are being paid at the lower scale.
§ Mr. HAROLD SMITHIs it not a fact that these women are receiving less pay for the hours they work than any other women in the Civil Service?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELThe answer is in the negative.
Mr. MacCALLUM SCOTTIs the right hon. Gentleman aware that the interpretation of the Hobhouse Committee's recommendation given by the Assistant Postmaster-General is contrary to his own interpretation, and will he say which interpretation we are to accept?
§ Mr. HERBERT SAMUELI am not aware that there has been any such inconsistency.