§ 51. Captain RAMAGEasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer if he is aware that a non-service technical officer who was summarily dismissed from the Air Ministry for the alleged disclosure of confidential information was re-engaged on Government work in connection with the Food Investigating Board, operating under the control of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research and financed by Government funds; if any application was made to the Joint Substitution Board for a suitably qualified ex-service man to fill this post; and why such preference was extended to a non-service man in the particular circumstances of the case?
§ The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Trevelyan)I have been asked to answer this question. It 243 relates, presumably, to a research worker who received a grant from the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research to undertake an urgent investigation for the Food Investigation Board. The arrangement was made on the advice of eminent men of science to whom he was personally known as exceptionally fitted for the work. The circumstances in which he left the service of the Air Ministry were not known to the Department until after the grant had been made. Grants to research workers (who are not employés of the Department) are not referred to the Joint Substitution Board, but the Department gives preference, other things being equal, to ex-service men.