§ 12. Mr. RENDALLasked the Under-Secretary of State for War whether the scales for payment to medical men for examining recruits (Southern Command Order 507, dated 13th March, 1915), set forth that for a whole day, defined as six working hours, and the examination of from thirty to forty recruits the payment of £2 is ordered to be made; that in certain towns the doctors declined to examine more than thirty-one recruits per day, and for this work have been paid the full fee of £2; that in other places doctors worked from nine to twelve hours, and in one case (Dr. Weaver, of Yeovil) 226 recruits were examined in fifteen consecutive hours, yet for these long hours and far greater number of examinations only the same fee of £2 is being paid as for the examination of thirty-one patients; whether there is dissatisfaction; and will he order the payment of £2 for each six hours' work and get his medical advisers to put these matters on a businesslike footing?
§ The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the WAR OFFICE (Mr. Forster)If a few recruits are examined in a day, the fee is 2s. 6d. a recruit. £2 is the payment for a full day's work. In view of the evil results of hurried examination it is not considered desirable to hold out to doctors pecuniary inducements to examine more than thirty to forty recruits in one day. I am not aware that the profession is dissatisfied with these arrangements.