§ 36. Mr. RONALD M'NEILLasked the Postmaster-General whether prior to the taking over by the Post Office of the National Telephone Company's business, telephone subscribers in St. Margarets, near Dover, were entitled for an inclusive charge of £8 per annum to an unlimited number of calls in an area which included the town of Dover, but that St. Margarets has now been made a separate area, so that calls to Dover are reckoned and charged as trunk calls; whether the total number of subscribers in the St. Margarets area is about forty; and whether, having regard to the fact that this new arrangement deprives subscribers in St. Margarets of the most valuable part of the rights they enjoyed under the National Telephone Company, he will revert to the old arrangement by which St. Margarets was included in the Doyer area?
§ Captain NORTONThe position as regards area facilities of subscribers on St. Margarets Telephone Exchange is exactly the same now as for a considerable period before the transfer of the National Telephone Company's business to the Post Office. It has not been possible to trace the exact date when the change to which the hon. Member refers took place, but it was apparently some time in November, 1908. Calls between St. Margarets and Dover are charged as junction calls, not trunk calls. The total number of subscribers to this exchange on 31st March, 1913, was forty-three. I do not propose at the moment to make any alteration in existing arrangements.