Sitting of 27 April 1909

Preamble
Mr. SPEAKER took the chair at a Quarter before Three of the clock.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
London, Chatham, and Dover Railway Bill.—[Lords]—Not amended,
Considered; to be read the third time.

NEW WRIT.
For the Attercliffe Division of Sheffield, in the room of Batty Langley, Esquire (Chiltern Hundreds).—[Mr. Joseph Pease.]

RETURNS.
Imperial Revenue (Collection and Expenditure) (Great Britain and Ireland).— Return ordered relating to Imperial Revenue (collection and expenditure) (Great Britain and Ireland) for the year ending the 31st day of March, 1909 (in continuation of Parliamentary Paper, No. 215, of Session 1908).—[Mr. Joseph Pease.]
Mercantile Marine (Foreign-going Agreements).—Return ordered showing the number of seamen (exclusive of officers) who entered into foreign-going agreements at the principal ports in the United Kingdom during each of the years 1906, 1907, and 1908, and the number and percentage of allotments made by them.—[Mr. Lewis Haslam.]
East India (Financial Statement).—Ordered address for return of the Indian Financial Statement for 1909–10, and of the proceedings of the Legislative Council of the Governor-General thereon.—[Mr. Hobhouse.]

PROVISIONAL ORDER BILLS.
The following Bills were presented and read the first time:—
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 1).—Bill to confirm certain Provisional Orders of the Local Government Board relating to Bridlington, Dorking, Newport Pagnell (Rural), and Totnes.—[Mr. Master-man.]
Local Government Provisional Orders (No. 2).—Bill to confirm certain Pro-
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visional Orders of the Local Government Board relating to Derby, Oswaldtwistle, Wallasey, and Walsall.—[Mr. Masterman.]
Gas Provisional Orders.—Bill to confirm certain Provisional Orders made by the Board of Trade under the Gas and Waterworks Facilities Act, 1870, relating to Prestatyn Gas and Fermoy Gas.—[Mr. Tennant.]

ORAL ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS.

  Moray Firth (Closing).
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs what steps have as yet been taken to gain the consent of foreign Powers to the closing of the Moray Firth in harmony with the regulations of the Scotch Fishery Board?
  Mr. DUNCAN PIRIE: Before the right hon. Gentleman answers the question may I ask if he is aware that so-called steps have been taken for about twelve years now by the Foreign Office and its representatives, with the only result that there is more trawling than has ever been the case before.
  The SECRETARY OF STATE for FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir Edward Grey): I am not aware of the fact stated by the hon. Member.
  Mr. PIRIE: I will be able to forward a list to him, and I shall put a question on the subject next week.
  Sir E. GREY: The hon. Member states that for the last twelve years various steps, have been taken by the Foreign Office. I am not aware what steps were taken with regard to the present situation. His Majesty's Government have decided not to approach the Powers on the subject at present, as the Bill now before the House is expected to provide a practical solution of the main matter of complaint, namely, that vessels flying a foreign flag can bring into British ports fish caught in waters from which British trawlers are excluded.
  Mr. PIRIE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that at this moment there are genuine foreign trawlers who do not come under the provisions of this Bill, and who land their fish at foreign ports, and will proceed to do so in the future with greater security if the present Bill becomes law. It will make it a preserve for the foreigner.
  Sir E. GREY: I was not aware of those facts. With regard to the hon. Member's prophecy, if his fear were realised, it would have to be taken into consideration.
  Mr. RAMSAY MACDONALD: Would the right hon. Gentleman tell us how many of the trawlers now engaged in the Moray Firth are nominally foreigners and how many real?
  Sir E. GREY: I am afraid I shall have to refer the hon. Member for a reply to that question to the hon. Member for Aberdeen.
  Mr. PIRIE: I will put a question on the matter this day week.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: The House may take it that the Foreign Office has abandoned all attempts to settle this matter.
  Sir E. GREY: I did not say all attempts—
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Diplomatic attempts I ought to have said.
  Sir E. GREY: I did not say the Foreign Office would not make any attempts. The purport of my answer was that the particular evil was hoped to be remedied by the Bill before the House. If that is the case, it may not be necessary to take other steps, but I do not preclude the possibility of other steps being taken in future if those hopes are not realised.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: The House may take it other steps will be taken if necessary?
  Mr. CATHCART WASON: Is it not a fact that the Bill before the House will greatly militate against any negotiations with foreign Powers?
  Sir E. GREY: I think we had better wait and see the effect of the Bill.

  Congo Affairs.
  Sir GILBERT PARKERasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs if the British Vice-Consul in the Katanga region of the Congo has forwarded complaints of interference on the part of the Belgian authorities with the free trading rights of British or coloured British subjects with the native population of that district; and if reports of this character have been received from British officials in British protected territories bordering the Congo territory?
  Sir E. GREY: His Majesty's Vice-Consul in the Katanga district has
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  reported that he has received from British subjects a certain number of complaints of the kind described in the question. One of these complaints has been forwarded to me as a typical example of their nature, but His Majesty's Vice-Consul seems to hope to be able to find a solution in conjunction with the local authorities of the Katanga district. I am informed by His Majesty's Secretary of State for the Colonies that he has received no reports of this character from officials in British protected territories.
  Sir GILBERT PARKER: I assume that the Government has made representations on this subject to the Belgian Government?
  Sir E. GREY: The whole matter is really covered by the correspondence in general which is now proceeding with the Belgian Government. Until we have brought that to a definite issue we cannot very well take up a particular case.
  Sir GILBERT PARKER: asked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether the Belgian Government has yet given satisfactory assurances that the rights of the native population of the Congo to trade freely in the produce of the soil all over the Congo with merchants of all nationalities are being or will be respected?
  Sir E. GREY: I would refer the hon. Member to the answer given yesterday to the hon. Member for North-West Norfolk, which applies equally to this question.
  Sir GILBERT PARKERasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs if arrangements have yet been made to supply the British Consular staff on the Upper Congo with adequate means of conveyance; if the contemplated permanent Vice-Consulate has been established in the Kasai region, and, if so, in what locality; and if he will furnish the names and residences of the actual staff attached to His Majesty's Consulate on the Congo?
  Sir E. GREY: As soon as His Majesty's Consul at Boma furnishes the estimate of the annual cost of upkeep of a steamer on the Upper Congo, for which he has been asked, measures for providing a suitable vessel will be undertaken. A permanent Vice-Consulate for the Kasai region has been instituted, and Luebo is proposed for the Vice-Consul's residence. His Majesty's Consular Staff in the Congo consists of:—Consul, the Hon. W. G. Thesiger, D.S.O., residing

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  at Boma; Vice-Consul, G. B. Beak, residing at Kambove, in the Katanga district; Vice-Consul, J. P. Armstrong, at Leopoldville; Vice-Consul, G. Campbell, at Stanleyville; and Vice-Consul, E. W. P. Thurston, who is about to take up his appointment in the Kasai district.
  Sir GILBERT PARKERasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs if he has received any further reports from His Majesty's Consular staff on the Congo as to the state of affairs since the Belgian Government assumed control of the administration of that territory; and, if so, when the House can be informed of their contents?
  Sir E. GREY: I continue to receive re ports, in the regular course, from His Majesty's Consular Officers as to the state of affairs in the Congo; but I do not think it would serve any useful purpose to lay further Papers in the present stage of the discussions with the Belgian Government.
  Sir GILBERT PARKERasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs if his attention has been drawn to the fact that the quantities of rubber now being obtained from the Kasai region of the Congo are steadily increasing, notwithstanding the disclosures as to the illegal and cruel methods by which this rubber is obtained, as reported by the British Consul in the White Book, Africa, No. 1, 1909; and, if so, what action, if any, does he propose to take in the matter?
  Sir E. GREY: My attention has not been drawn to any special increase in the quantity of rubber now being obtained from the Kasai region, but I am asking for a report on the subject. The matter forms part of the general question of the treatment of the Congo natives, which is covered by the correspondence with the Belgian Government at present under consideration.

  Permanent Arbitration Treaties.
  Mr. BYLESasked the Secretary for Foreign Affairs whether he has any official intimation that permanent arbitration treaties have been quite recently concluded by the Empire of Brazil with the United States, France, Portugal, Spain, Mexico, or any of those countries?
  Sir E. GREY: I am informed by His Majesty's representative at Rio that Brazil has lately concluded an arbitration treaty with the United States, and that proposals have been made for similar treaties with a number of European Powers, France and
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  Portugal, however, being excepted. I am not aware whether any such treaty has been concluded with Mexico. An arbitration treaty between Brazil and this country is also under negotiation.
  Mr. BYLES: Might not the example thus set be advantageously followed by this country?
  Sir E. GREY: The last sentence of my reply was that an arbitration treaty between Brazil and this country was also under negotiation.

  Persia (Affairs at Tabriz).
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he could make any further statement as to the condition of affairs in Persia, particularly with regard to Tabriz; and whether British life and property were adequately safeguarded?
  Sir E. GREY: I have received no information respecting any change in the general situation in Persia since the date of the last reply which I returned to the hon. Member. With regard to Tabriz, His Majesty's Minister at Teheran has reported that the Shah has ordered the suspension of hostilities till further orders, and the opening of the roads for the admission of food into the town. A Russian force is being got ready to start to protect the Consulates and foreign subjects if need be. I have no information as to any fresh danger to British lives and property.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: When may we reasonably hope that the food will arrive at Tabriz? The population is starving.
  Sir E. GREY: Everything has been done to secure the opening of the roads. I trust that, if they are not opened by the Shah's forces under his instructions, the starting of the Russian force will secure the opening.
  Mr. SMEATON: When is the Russian relief force likely to arrive?
  Sir E. GREY: I understand the last intention was that it should start to-morrow from the Russian frontier.
  Mr. PONSONBY: Is there a clear understanding with the Russian Government that the Russian troops enter Tabriz only in order to guard the Consulates?
  Sir E. GREY: To guard the Consulates and protect foreigners. It will also make sure of the opening of the roads for the food supply.

  Turkey.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he could make any further statement with regard to the present state of Turkish affairs in Europe and in Asia; and whether British life and property were adequately safeguarded?
  Sir E. GREY: I am still unable to say what is likely to happen in Turkey, but it is satisfactory to note that foreigners were efficiently protected during the recent fighting in Constantinople. With regard to the provinces, the situation still shows signs of unrest, but it is to be hoped that the authority which has gained full control in Constantinople may have a pacifying influence elsewhere. The disposition of His Majesty's ships in Turkish waters is, in the main, as described in my answer to the hon. Member's question of the 22nd instant. His Majesty's ship "Triumph" has proceeded from Alexandretta to Antioch Bay, to be as near as possible to Antioch, where disturbances have occurred.
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: Has the right hon. Gentleman any information as to the deposition of the Sultan, reported in the evening papers?
  Sir E. GREY: No, Sir; I have not.

  Egypt (Children in Cotton Factories).
  Mr. JOHN ROBERTSONasked whether anything had been recently done by the Egyptian Government to improve the condition of children working in the cotton factories of Egypt?
  Sir E. GREY: Full information on this subject will be found in Sir Eldon Gorst's Annual Report, which will be laid shortly.

  Egypt (Dervish Prisoners).
  Mr. JOHN ROBERTSONasked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he could give the names and ages of the Dervish prisoners still incarcerated in Egypt, and state the present place of their detention; and whether there was yet any prospect of their being released?
  Sir E. GREY: The names of the Dervish prisoners still incarcerated are: Osman Digna, Yunes el Dekin, Abdul Bagi Abdel Wakil, Ibrahim Malik, Mohammed Ahmed el Helw, Ismail Ahmed, and Mohammed el Mahdi Ahmed. I do not know their ages. It was decided during the past year to transfer the Dervish prisoners from Damietta to the more congenial surround-
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  ings of Wadi Haifa. On the 9th March, one Emir, with his family, was removed to these new quarters, and on the 5th April five others followed. Finally, on the 20th December, Osman Digna left Damietta to join his compatriots. The majority of the prisoners enjoy considerable liberty within the precincts of Wadi Halfa, but Osman Digna has not abandoned that fanatical spirit which might still render him a source of danger. I cannot add anything further to previous answers.

  Payne Tariff Bill.
  Sir GILBERT PARKER (on behalf of Mr. F. E. Smith)asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether his attention had been called to Section 4 of the Payne Tariff Bill now before the Congress of the United States, which proposed to subject to the maximum tariff the products of any country or colony which discriminated against the United States; whether that section would subject Canadian goods to the maximum tariff of the United States unless Canada granted to the United States the intermediate rates and the special concessions granted to France under the Franco-Canadian Treaty; and what steps His Majesty's Government proposed to take in view of the importance of the question as affecting imperial interests and the relations of the United States and France to the British Empire?
  Sir E. GREY: The answer to the first and second parts of the question is in the affirmative. The matter does not seem to be one on which representations can properly be addressed to the United States Government. Section 4 has been withdrawn from the Bill as presented to the Senate.

  Opium Traffic (Ceylon).
  Mr. WALTER ROCH (on behalf of Sir Herbert Roberts)asked the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the Ceylon Government had postponed the closing of its licensed opium shops during the present year pending a reference to the Secretary of State; and whether a statement had been received by the Secretary of State from three non-official ex-members of the Ceylon Legislative Council protesting against further delay in carrying out the policy unanimously recommended by the local opium commissioners in their report at the end of 1907?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Colonel Seely): The facts are as stated in the first part of my

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  hon. Friend's question, but I should explain that the reason for the delay is that a difficulty has arisen as to the regulation of the supply of opium for medicinal purposes to the Vederalas, or native doctors, of whom there is a large number in the Colony. This difficulty has led to a further reference to the Secretary of State, who is now in communication with the Governor as to the best means of surmounting it. As regards the second part of the question, the Secretary of State has received the statement referred to, but for the reason I have already given has been unable as yet to take action in the direction suggested by the signatories.

  Wyggeston School, Leicester (Scheme).
  Mr. SEARS (on behalf of Sir George Kekewich)asked why the scheme for the Wyggeston School, Leicester, contained a clause requiring every head master, before taking office, to sign an agreement that he would, it removed from his office, acquiesce in such removal and relinquish all claim to the mastership, seeing that no clause to the same effect appears in the scheme for the Plymouth College and Mannamead School; and which of these schemes represented, in the matter referred to, the settled policy of the Board?
  The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Tre-velyan): The scheme for Plymouth College and Mannamead School contains a general provision for contracts of service between the masters and Governors, and it is contemplated that acquiescence in removal would be one of the terms of the contract to be entered into by the head master. The scheme for the Wyggeston School, Leicester, contains the clause in question in order to avoid the possibility of litigation if a head master should refuse to relinquish office on dismissal.

  Board of Education (Circulars).
  Mr. SEARS (on behalf of Sir George Kekewich)asked how many fresh circulars had been framed and issued to local authorities and correspondents of training colleges, respectively, during each of the six years ended 31st March, 1909?
  Mr. TREVELYAN: The number of circulars addressed to local education authorities during the six years referred to was 13, 18, 14, 9, 11, and 12 respectively. The number addressed to training colleges during the same period was 3, 4, 1, 1, 3, and 4. These figures do not include a cer-
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  tain number of circulars addressed to other bodies, copies of which were sent to local education authorities and training colleges for their information only.

  Cost of Elementary Education (Parts of Lindsey).
  Captain MORRISON-BELL (on behalf of Mr. Renton)asked the President of the Board of Education, if he could state in how many elementary schools in the administrative county of the Parts of Lindsey increased cost would be entailed in the event of Circular 709 of the Board of Education becoming operative?
  Mr TREVELYAN: I have not received any estimate of the cost from the Lindsey County Council, and without such an estimate I am unable to give any exact figures as to the additional cost which the provisions of the Circular will necessarily entail.

  Mr. Aswini Dutt (Imprisonment).
  Dr. RUTHERFORDasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether the Secretary of State had had his attention called to a petition presented to the Government of India by the wife of Mr. Aswini Dutt, who had been for upwards of four months imprisoned without charge or trial; whether he was aware that the petition cited a number of testimonials given at various times by Anglo-Indian officials, including lieutenant-governors, to the high character and work of Mr. Dutt as an educationalist and social reformer; whether the Secretary of State had any reason to doubt the accuracy of those testimonials; and, if not, whether he would take them into consideration in determining how much longer Mr. Dutt was to be detained in prison without being given an opportunity of answering any charges that may have been made against him?
  The FINANCIAL SECRETARY to the TREASURY (Mr. Hobhouse, replying in the absence of Mr. Buchanan): The Secretary of State has not seen the petition; but he is sufficiently informed as to Mr. Dutt's character and work, and he sees no reason to think that it is desirable for him to take into special consideration the testimonials referred to.
  Mr. JOHN ROBERTSON (on behalf of Mr. A. H. Scott)asked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether he was aware that the wife of Mr. Aswini Kumar Dutt, one of the British subjects in India who, in December last, was deported from

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  his home without charge or trial, had presented a petition to the Viceroy asking to be made aware of the reasons of State which led to her husband's deportation, alleging his readiness to meet any charges that could be brought against him, and praying that, on the ground of his ill-health and the peace and quiet prevailing in the district, he might be released from prison; whether the Viceroy had made any reply to this petition, and, if so, whether the Secretary of State was aware what that reply was?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The Secretary of State is aware that Mr. Dutt's wife submitted a memorial, stating that he was suffering from diabetes and expressing apprehension as to the effects of imprisonment on his health; the Viceroy was able to inform her in reply that her husband's health had in fact improved since his arrival at Lucknow and continued good.
  Mr. JOHN ROBERTSON: Has the Secretary of State taken into account the position and work of Mr. Aswini Dutt?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I have answered that question in reply to the hon. Member for Brentford.

  Deportations from India.
  Mr. CATHCART WASON (on behalf of Mr. Rees)asked whether persons deported by the Government of India, under Regulation III. of 1818, received regular medical attendance and were provided with everything which the Government medical officer, empowered in this behalf, certified to be necessary to their present comfort and speedy recovery from any illnesses from which any or all of such persons were suffering; and whether, if peace and quiet now prevailed in the districts in which such persons formerly resided, the Government of India would duly consider whether such peace and quiet were likely to continue to prevail in such districts if such persons were prematurely released?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The answer to the first part of the question is in the affirmative; as to the second part, the Government of India will no doubt consider the point mentioned, when the proper time comes.
  Mr. MACKARNESSasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether information had reached the Secretary of State that in a recent debate in the Viceroy's Legislative Council the Hon. Mr. Gokhale made an urgent appeal to the Government of India to restore to
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  their homes the nine British subjects who were deported in December without charge or trial, on the grounds that the situation was rapidly improving; that it would give great satisfaction throughout the country, and that it would be a bare act of justice to men, some of whom he knew to be of the highest character; and whether he could state what reply was given to Mr. Gokhale's appeal?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The Secretary of State has seen a report of the speech referred to; the reply was to the effect that the Government, who had the fullest information, were the best judges as to the necessities of the case. The Government refused to admit either that they had acted on unreliable information or that there was any error at all in their action.
  Mr. MACKARNESS: Has the Secretary of State any reason to doubt Mr. Gokhale's statement that the condition of things is rapidly improving?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: I do not know; perhaps the hon. Member will put down a question on the point.

  Revenue from Excisable Liquors and Drugs (India).
  Mr. WALTER ROCH (on behalf of Sir Herbert Roberts)asked what was the total net revenue from excisable liquors and drugs in India in the years 1874–5, 1883–4, 1894–5, 1904–5, 1905–6, 1906–7, 1907–8, and 1908–9; and what was the estimated revenue for 1909–10?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: As the answer includes a number of figures I will have it circulated with the Votes. [See Written Answers this date.]

  Civil Servants (Pensionable Service).
  Mr. SEARS (on behalf of Sir George Kekewich)asked why, in some cases, when unestablished civil servants were promoted to the establishment the whole of the unestablished service, and, in other cases, only half the unestablished service, was allowed to count as pensionable service; and what was the reason that, in the latter cases, half the unestablished service was rejected as not pensionable?
  Mr. HOBHOUSE: The Treasury have only power under section 3 of the Superannuation Act, 1887, to reckon unestablished service for pension "if, in their opinion, any special circumstances of the case warrant such a course." In exercising this power the Treasury have regard

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  to the character and conditions of each class of employment; and it is not possible to lay down any rates of general application.

  Convention of Royal Burghs (Scotland).
  Mr. LAMONTasked the Lord Advocate whether he was aware that, at the recent meeting of the Convention of the Royal Burghs of Scotland, a resolution was unanimously passed desiring that the Scottish office should be represented at future meetings of the Convention; and whether, in view of the mutual advantage to be anticipated therefrom, he would take steps to give effect to this resolution?
  The LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. Ure): The proceedings of the Convention are always followed with attention by the Scottish Office, and its recommendations receive careful consideration. My Noble Friend the Secretary for Scotland is not satisfied that the course now suggested by the Convention would secure any further advantage, and he fears it might lead to some misconception as to the relations between the Scottish Office and the Convention, and possibly to similar claims being pressed by other non-official organisations.
  Mr. WATT: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that the Scottish Office has got out of touch with public opinion in Scotland? This proposal might be the means of bringing them together again.
  Mr. URE: I am not aware of that.

  Vatersay Island.
  Mr. YOUNGERasked the Lord Advocate whether anyone with authority to represent the interests of the Government has been sent to the island of Vatersay since it was acquired by purchase from Lady Gordon Cathcart; what is the present position of the settlers there; whether any steps have been taken to provide a suitable water supply; and what generally are the prospects of satisfactorily creating crofting settlements on the island?
  The LORD ADVOCATE (Mr. Ure): The answer to the first part of the hon. Member's question is in the affirmative. Steps are now being taken with a view to the settlement of the island, by improvement of the water supply and otherwise, and applications for land from persons desiring to be settlers have been invited and are being received. It is believed
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  that the action taken gives a reasonable prospect of a satisfactory settlement.
  Mr. YOUNGER: Is the right hon. Gentleman getting a water supply on the island, or is he getting it from the mainland, and what is the expense?
  Mr. URE: From the island, I believe; but I am not in a position to say at what expense.
  Mr. YOUNGERasked the Lord Advocate when papers with reference to the purchase of and proposed crofting settlements on the island of Vatersay will be presented to the House; and whether the recent correspondence with Mr. Duncan Campbell will be included?
  The LORD ADVOCATE: These papers have been presented in another place. The recent correspondence referred to is not included; but if the hon. Member desires to see it I will furnish him with a copy.
  Mr. YOUNGER: Would not the better way be to put down an unstarred question, so that the correspondence might be printed for everybody to see it?
  Mr. URE: I will consider that.

  Window Breaking (Oxford Street).
  Mr. O'GRADYasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether he is aware of the sentence of 18 months' hard labour passed on a man named John Smith for breaking a window in Oxford-street on 16th February of this year; and whether, having regard to the time Smith has already spent in prison and that his action was the result of being out of employment, any steps will be taken to mitigate the original sentence or release the man in question?
  The UNDER-SECRETARY for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Mr. Herbert Samuel): The prisoner's offence was inciting others to steal. In view of the character of the offence and the bad antecedents of the offender, the Secretary of State regrets that he can see no ground for advising any reduction of the sentence. The prisoner has availed himself of his rights under the Criminal Appeal Act, but the Court refused his application.

  Children Act (Children at Public-house Doors).
  Mr. RENDALLasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department whether his attention has been called to the practice of certain parents, since the coming

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  into operation of the Children Act, of taking their children to the doors of public-houses, where liquor is handed to the parents by their friends; and whether, seeing that, when such practices take place in the late hours of the evening and in the vicinity of such parents' homes, cruelty is inflicted upon the children so exposed, he will circularise the authorities controlling the police exhorting them to prosecute in such cases?
  Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: The Secretary of State's attention has been called to this matter. Merely to keep a young child at the door of a public-house would not in itself amount to cruelty, but it might be done under circumstances and conditions which would cause unnecessary suffering, and thus constitute an offence. If facts come to the knowledge of the police which justify them in proceeding against a parent, the Secretary of State has no doubt that they will be prepared to take action; and he does not think it necessary to issue a circular on the subject.
  Mr. RENDALL: Is the right hon. Gentleman not aware that the police reports show that a large number of children of very tender age are seen very often outside public-houses between 11 and 12 o'clock at night, and does not this fact show cruelty to the children?
  Mr. HERBERT SAMUEL: It necessarily depends upon the circumstances of each particular case. It is impossible to lay down a general rule.

  Royal Navy (Northumberland Coal).
  Mr. RENWICKasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he will state the names of the British battleships, cruisers, and scouts which, while in commission and at sea, have used Northumberland steam coal during the last six months; and what was the quantity of such coal used in each ship during the period named?
  The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Mr. McKenna): The ships to which supplies of Northumberland steam coal were made during the six months ended 31st March, 1909, were the "Cæsar," "Hannibal," and "Majestic"; the "Jupiter" and "Prince George" also had bituminous coal in their bunkers. It is not considered to be in the public interest to furnish details of the actual consumption in ships.
  Mr. RENWICK: May I ask if the right hon. Gentleman will state, without giving
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  the quantities, whether these coals were used for a short experimental run, or for a cruise?
  Mr. McKENNA: I could not answer that question without notice.

  Atlantic Fleet (Torpedo Flotilla).
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, in view of the statement by the Commander-in-Chief of the Atlantic Fleet on 29th March last that under the new scheme of naval distribution each group or fleet in Home waters was a self-contained naval force, he will give the House the names of the fleet scouts, torpedo craft, and auxiliary vessels belonging or attached to the Atlantic Fleet, or in any way under the orders of the Commander-in-Chief of that fleet?
  Mr. McKENNA: No flotilla of torpedo craft with accompanying scouts and auxiliary vessels is at present permanently associated with the Atlantic Fleet.

  Reserve Destroyer Flotilla.
  Mr. MIDDLEMOREasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether, when the reserve destroyer flotilla at the Nore leaves Sheerness for its cruise, he will give instructions for the vessel to proceed at full speed to their destination in order that their degree of reliability may be ascertained?
  Mr. McKENNA: The reply to the hon. Member's question is in the negative.
  Mr. MIDDLEMORE: May I ask whether these vessels can proceed at full speed, and whether they have received orders not to proceed at full speed?
  Mr. McKENNA: Yes, Sir, they can proceed at full speed.
  An HON MEMBER: What is the full speed?

  Naval Building Programme.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether he is aware that the Prime Minister has laid it down that every ship that we build should be in accordance with all the developments and the most advanced naval architecture; and whether these conditions will be fulfilled in the case of the four battleships which the Government is about to commence?
  Mr. McKENNA: The reply to the hon. Member is in the affirmative.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEE: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that the delay in the construction of the second four ships of this

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  year's programme has been officially ascribed to the necessity for waiting for the working out of designs which shall embody the latest improvements, and whether in view of that fact he will now give the House some more correct explanation of the reasons for delay?
  Mr. McKENNA: The hon. Gentleman's question referred to the first four ships, not the second portion. As regards the second portion, if he will put down a supplementary question as to the precise information he desires, I shall endeavour to oblige him.
  Mr. ARTHUR LEEasked the First Lord of the Admiralty whether the Government has reason to suppose that the four battleships which it has definitely decided to build this year are inferor in fighting capacity to the latest foreign designs; and, if not, what justification there is for not proceeding at the earliest possible moment with the full number necessary to secure an adequate margin of superiority in this class of ship in 1911–12?
  Mr. McKENNA: The Government will proceed at the earliest possible moment with the construction of the full number necessary to secure an adequate margin of superiority in battleships in 1911–12. The four ships of the new programme to be laid down in 1909 will be of no inferiority in fighting capacity to the latest foreign designs.
  Mr. ASHLEY: Can the right hon. Gentleman say what is the armament of these four ships of 1909–10 to be laid down?
  Mr. McKENNA: No, Sir; I think it would be highly undesirable.

  Railway Amalgamation.
  Mr. WARDLEasked the President of the Board of Trade whether, in the event of the Great Northern, Great Central, and Great Eastern working union Bill not being proceeded with, he still intends to appoint a Committee to inquire into the question of amalgamation and working agreements with respect to the railways of the country?
  A similar question stood on the paper in the name of Mr. CECIL HARMSWORTH.
  The PRESIDENT of the BOARD of TRADE (Mr. Churchill): I will answer both questions together. I am now considering the best form and scope of a Parliamentary inquiry into the questions referred to, and hope to be in a position to make an announcement shortly.

  Provincial Homes Investment Company.
  Mr. WARDLEalso asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he has had an offer from the manager of the Provincial Homes Investment Company, Limited, for the Board of Trade to inspect the books and documents of the said company; and, if so, whether he intends to avail himself of the offer?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Last December one of the directors of the Provincial Homes Investment Company inquired whether the Board of Trade would be willing to hold an investigation into the business and financial position of the company, with the object of advising what alterations should be made in the methods of the business. After very careful consideration I came to the conclusion that the giving of any such advice would be entirely outside the province of the Board of Trade, and accordingly declined to make the investigation suggested.
  Mr. WARDLE: Do we understand the right hon. Gentleman to say that there was an offer to see the books?
  Mr. CHURCHILL: Certainly, and I was at first inclined to accept it; but after conversation with many of the authorities and officials, and considering the consequences that would be drawn from such an inquiry by the Board of Trade, and remembering, too, that it would be largely covering cases which had been dealt with, I came to the conclusion that it would be in the general interest not to make the inquiry.

  Dublin Castle Jewel Thefts.
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland if he will state the amount of money paid by an employé of the Irish Government to the leading pawnbroker in Ireland in 1907 for the redemption of Major Lambert's badges of the Order of St. Patrick, manufactured in 1895 by Messrs. West and Son, the Dublin jewellers, and stolen from the room in Dublin Castle from which the Crown jewels were stolen later in the same year; who supplied that redemption money; at whose instance and with what object were the police compelled to withhold from the public, from inquirers, and from the Vice-regal Crown Jewels Commission, the fact of the earlier theft of the Lambert ornaments from the same place in the same year, the names of the thief and pawner, and the other information in their possession relating to that crime, and to permit the guilty to leave the country; and

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  whether the Irish Government have the same or similar reasons for resisting a public sworn inquiry into the theft of the Lambert ornaments as into that of the Crown jewels?
  The CHIEF SECRETARY for IRELAND (Mr. Birrell): The badges referred to were Major Lambert's personal property. They were stolen in 1905 by a servant, not from the room from which the Crown jewels were subsequently stolen, but from the private house in Dublin Castle occupied by Major Lambert as Chamberlain to the Lord Lieutenant of the day. The badges were pawned for £2. The theft was not discovered till 1907, when the pawnbroker, who was arranging for a sale of forfeited pledges, having ascertained the name of the owner, communicated with the police, and through them restored the badges to Major Lambert, who refunded the amount lent on them. The servant who stole the badges had then left the country, and the man who pawned them was in prison. The stealing of the badges was an ordinary case of larceny, and had no connection with the theft of the Crown jewels. No information with regard to it has been withheld, and there is no need for any inquiry.
  Mr. GINNELL: Will the right hon. Gentleman inform the House, why in this particular case the Irish Government have shown as much anxiety as the criminals to withhold information to prevent effective inquiry?
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member should submit a question of that character to me before he asks it. It hardly seems to arise out of the answer. Perhaps he will ask his next question?
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary for Ireland whether he has read all the reports made by the police appointed to investigate the thefts of valuable property committed in Dublin Castle in 1907; whether they disclose, in addition to the thefts of Crown jewels, other thefts and other indictable offences and connect named persons with those offences; and whether he will allow crime committed at the centre of Irish Government to escape Criminal investigation?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The police reports referred to do not disclose any thefts or indictable offences in addition to the theft of the Crown jewels.
  Mr. GINNELL: Arising out of both of these questions, is not the right hon. Gen-
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  tleman aware of the existence of reports—if he has not read them—implicating, as principal and accomplices in theft, and also as principals in sodomy and other beastly crimes, of F. R. Shackleton and Captain Gorges—
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member has really no right to bring in the names of gentlemen in connection with matters of that sort without submitting his question to me. I will say whether it is a proper one to ask.
  Mr. GINNELL: On a point of order, I am not allowed to put this question on the paper, and I am not to challenge inquiry in the Press. Am I allowed to inquire in this House?
  Mr. SPEAKER: No.
  Mr. GINNELLasked the Chief Secretary if he will explain why the crimes found by the police to have been committed in Dublin Castle in 1907 are not included in the statistics of Irish crime for that year; and if he will take steps to have included in future criminal statistics all the crimes that come to the knowledge of the police, irrespective of person and place?
  Mr. BIRRELL: No crimes known to the police were omitted from the statistics for 1907.
  Mr. GINNELL: I would like to ask why is the crime of sodomy not included in the statistics in question?
  Mr. BIRRELL: Because there was no allegation of any such crime, and no such crime could possibly be included.
  Mr. GINNELL: Is it not a fact that the only practical steps taken by the Irish Government to recover the stolen jewels and to get others in their stead was to shower honours by way of bribes upon a Belfast millionaire?
  Mr. BIRRELL: No, Sir.
  Mr. GINNELL: I beg to give notice that I will take further action, and ask further questions—
  Mr. SPEAKER: The hon. Member is not required to give notice of the fact that he is going to ask questions. All that is required is to hand them in.

  Revolver Firing, Lismore, County Longford.
  Mr. JOHN PHILLIPSasked the Chief Secretary if he is aware that two men named Stratford, in the employment of Harris Martin, of Lismore, county Longford, deliberately fired three revolver shots

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  at the five sons of Henry Burke, Fiogues, Killashee, where they were working in their garden, wounding one of them; will he say what action the authorities are taking in this case; what report did the police make; will he take precautions to prevent such a class of men using revolvers in such a reckless manner in the future; and has he any official information showing that these men are paid by a society in Belfast?
  Mr. BIRRELL: The two men referred to in the question have been proceeded against, and are now awaiting trial at next assizes. The case is therefore sub judice, and I cannot make any statement with regard to it, beyond saying that I am informed that none of the shots took effect.

  Quarter Sessions, Clare (Statement by Judge Bodkin).
  Mr. HALPINasked the Chief Secretary whether his attention has been called to the statement made by County Court Judge Bodkin, K.C., at the Quarter Sessions sitting at Kilrush last week, to the effect that there were no criminal cases to be investigated, and that this was a most satisfactory state of affairs, and was more or less of an answer to the many aspersions which had lately been made against the condition of the county; and whether, in view of this judicial expression of opinion as to the satisfactory state of the county, he will now order the withdrawal of the extra police from this district?
  Mr. BIRRELL: My attention has been called to the learned Judge's remarks to the effect stated in the question. The fact that there were no criminal cases for hearing at Quarter Sessions in one division of the county cannot be taken as a representation of the state of the county as a whole. There has recently been some improvement, but there are not yet sufficient grounds for reducing the police.

  Two-Power Standard (United States Navy).
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIGasked the Prime Minister, whether it is the policy of the Government to take into consideration the Navy of the United States of America when estimating the number of ships necessary to maintain the two-Power standard? I must protest respectfully that the right hon. Gentleman, having asked me to postpone this question on two ocoasions to suit his convenience, is not here to-day to answer it himself.
  Mr. McKENNA: My right hon. Friend is extremely sorry, but he is detained on other business, and he has asked me to answer for him. This is an academic question, as, under existing conditions, the Navy of the United States of America, for the practical purposes of the two-Power standard as defined in my right hon. Friend's speech on the Navy Estimates, would not enter into the account.
  Sir GILBERT PARKER: Is it a fact that the United States are not brought into account because they have no "Dreadnoughts"?
  Mr. McKENNA: No.
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIG: Arising out of that, as I consider unsatisfactory reply—
  Mr. SPEAKER: Order, order. The hon. Member is not entitled to reflect upon the answer.
  Mr. CHARLES CRAIG: I withdraw. I beg to give notice that at an early date I will call the attention of the House to the conflicting expressions of opinion of various Members of the Government on this vital question of naval defence.
  Mr. C. BELLAIRS: If the United States is one of the two next strongest navies in the world will it be included under these conditions?
  Mr. McKENNA: That is a hypothetical question to be answered when the circumstances arise.
  Mr. BELLAIRS: Is it not a matter of dispute as to whether the United States is not the second Navy in the world at this moment?
  Mr. McKENNA: For the purposes set out in my right hon. Friend's statement on the Navy Estimates the United States would not be regarded as the second Power.
  Mr. BELLAIRS: Was it not specifically stated in this House on 12th and 23rd November, and again on 17th December, that the two-Power standard applies to the next two strongest Powers, and is not this statement a violation of that pledge?
  Mr. McKENNA: My right hon. Friend has defined explicitly, in his speech upon the Navy Estimates, how we constitute the two-Power standard.

  Kew Gardens' Employés.
  Mr. SUMMERBELLasked the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agricul-

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  ture, whether a communication, dated 12th March, has been received from the secretary of the Royal Gardens, Kew, Employés' Union, in relation to a number of sub-foremen and gardeners employed at the Royal Gardens, Kew, who are under notice of dismissal; and, if so, will he say whether the Department intends to allow the precedent mentioned therein to stand.
  The TREASURER of the HOUSEHOLD (Sir E. Strachey): The reply to the first part of the question is in the affirmative. The sub-foremen and gardeners, to whom my hon. Friend refers, were not dismissed; their period of service terminated in ordinary course under the regulations applicable to the gardening service at Kew. It is not proposed to make a practice of extending the normal period of service, as was done in certain cases under exceptional circumstances last year.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: Do I understand the hon. Gentleman to say that when these men were appointed at Kew there was a time stipulated when they should cease to be employed?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: Yes, sir.

  Northumberland Sea Fishing.
  Mr. CLOUGHasked the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he is aware that the Duke of Northumberland imposes a £5 licence-fee upon every fishing boat fishing within three miles of the coast throughout the length of that county; and whether he is prepared to propose a time limit, say of 14 years, after which this monopoly shall be recovered for the fishing industry concerned, or for the State?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: We have no official information on this subject. There is no intention of proposing legislation respecting it.

  Horse Breeding (United Kingdom).
  Major ANSTRUTHER-GRAYasked the hon. Member for South Somerset, as representing the President of the Board of Agriculture, whether he can now make any statement as to the result of his consideration of the offer which he recently received, with a view to the encouragement of horse-breeding in the United Kingdom?
  Sir E. STRACHEY: I am not in a position to make any statement on this matter at present.

  Army (Annual) Bill (Lords' Amendments).
  Mr. STEWART BOWLES: May I ask the Secretary of State for War, as representing the Prime Minister, whether it is intended to take the consideration of the Lords' Amendments to the Army (Annual) Bill after eleven o'clock to-night?
  Mr. HALDANE: Not to-night; to-morrow some time.

  National Defence (Scope of Inquiry).
  Mr. GRETTONasked the Prime Minister if he can yet state what will be the scope of the inquiry to be made by the Sub-Committee of the Committee of National Defence; and if, in view of comparatively recent changes, that inquiry will include the present organisation of the Board of Admiralty and the distribution of business amongst its members.
  Mr. HALDANE: The answer to the first paragraph is that the inquiry will cover all the points as to the readiness for war during the last two years of the fleets in home waters raised by Lord Charles Beresford in his letter to the Prime Minister. It would not conduce to the objects of the inquiry or be in the public interest to announce at this stage the precise terms of the reference. The answer to the second paragraph is in the negative.
  Mr. GRETTONasked the Prime Minister if he will give the names of the members of the present Committee of National Defence?
  Mr. HALDANE (who replied): I will circulate the names with the Votes and Proceedings.
  Mr. GRETTON: Will that be done today?
  Mr. HALDANE: It will be done without delay. [See Written Answers this date.]

PRESENTATION OF BILLS.
The following Bills were presented and read the first time:—
Sir WILLIAM COLLINS Sir WILLIAM COLLINS—Metropolitan Ambulances.—Bill to enable the London County Council to establish and maintain an Ambulance Service in London.—(To be read a second time, 10th May.)
Mr. FEEENS Mr. FEEENS—Association of Port Sanitary Authorities (Expenses).—Bill to legalise the payment of a subscription to the funds of the Association or the council.—(To be read a second time, 11th May.)

SUPPLY.
CONSIDERED IN COMMITTEE.
SUPPLY.
  FIFTH ALLOTTED DAY.
    CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPARTMENTS ESTIMATES, 1909–10.
    [REVENUE DEPARTMENTS.]

  POST OFFICE VOTE.
  [Mr. EMMOTT in the chair.]
  (IN THE COMMITTEE).
  Motion made, and Question proposed: "That a sum not exceeding £12,277,930 be granted to His Majesty to complete the sum necessary to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1910, for the salaries and expenses of the Post Office, including Telegraphs and Telephones."
  The POSTMASTER-GENERAL (Mr. Sydney Buxton): Although a somewhat short notice has been given in regard to this Vote, I think I may take it that hon. Members are prepared to discuss it, and I observe from the Order Paper that several hon. Members are desirous of reducing my salary. I venture, in accordance with custom, to detain the House with certain observations before I actually come to the real business. I am sorry to say that for the first time for some years the revenue of the Post Office has not shown that elasticity which has marked it of late years, and during the last year there has been not indeed a falling off, but a want of elasticity in regard to the business of the Post Office. Whilst the actual revenue of the past year is practically the same as the previous year, it must be remembered that there was a loss of £160,000 for various postal reforms which were brought into force last year, and there has also been a loss of two days' revenue, which makes up the amount to about £300,000. Therefore, although the actual revenue does not look so satisfactory, as a matter of fact the revenue this year, as compared with the previous year, shows a growth of something like £300,000.
  The Committee will remember that last year I ventured, in view of the falling off of the revenue, to suggest that I should be very glad to hear of any suggestions or proposals for increasing the revenue of the
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  Post Office. I have had a good many suggestions, but I am sorry to say that they are not of very great practical value. Some have said that they will wait to hear what payment I will make before they allow me to know what their proposals are. At present the Treasury are so conservative that they are not prepared to enter into speculations, and therefore I had to negative many suggestions. Other proposals seem to run very largely on matrimony or branches of that institution. One lady suggested that all offers of marriage should be made through the Postmaster-General by telephone at a special fee; and on the other hand I had a suggestion made from a gentleman that in the case of an action for breach of promise of marriage the plaintiff should not win his or her case unless he or she could show a written promise of marriage to which should be attached half-a-crown's worth of penny stamps. It appears to me that that lady and gentleman seemed to be suffering from much the same evil in different ways. I have had suggestions made that I should utilise the many thousand telephone and telegraph poles for advertising purposes, more especially for advertisements for soap and pills which seem at the present moment to be the two requisites of human nature. I think there is something to be said for them, but I do not think we have actually come to that at the present time, and I am afraid the æsthetic sense of hon. Members of this House would pronounce against those advertisements. I am afraid, therefore, that I must pronounce as a failure the sources of revenue suggested for my advantage.
  Turning from that, and taking the individual branches of revenue, I will take first what I have described as the sheet anchor of the postal revenue, namely, the penny stamp, which I am sorry to say has not been very satisfactory this year. In these days of cheapness the halfpenny post has largely superseded the penny post. In addition a very large part of the correspondence which used to be carried on by the penny post is now carried on by telephone, and the telephone has not only interfered with the penny postage, but it has largely cut into the telegraph service as well, and has thus affected the only profitable class of this service, namely, short messages. The telegraphs from their inception have never been a real source of profit to the State. The telephone service shows a very fair increase of revenue, and I have been anxious to distinguish definitely between the telegraphs

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  and the telephone revenue. Whilst the telegraphs unfortunately are past praying for, the telephone system, I think, can be put and kept upon a paying basis. I have had correspondence with the chambers of commerce and others, and I am glad to have had the opportunity in the last two or three years of getting into intimate touch with chambers of commerce, borough councils, and other aggregations of public interest in postal matters. They have, of course, represented to me that the present rate is too high and ought to be reduced; but my answer to that has been—and I think in this I shall have the support of the House—that it is too early yet to consider any question of a reduction of telephone rates, and we must wait until we have taken over the Telephone Company and then see how matters stand. I think that will be the proper time to have an inquiry to see whether the charges ought to be reduced or increased.
  A very large expansion has taken place in the telephone service this year. We have opened no less than 102 new exchanges, no doubt many of them small ones; we have opened 55 call offices in connection with trunk wires, and perhaps it will interest county Members of this House to know that we have opened no less than 230 new rural call offices, many of them in the fruit or hop districts, and I think these have been a real advantage to the industries in the particular areas. I am bound to say that these small exchanges and call offices are not, as a rule, whilst in the initial stages, worked on a profitable basis, but we look to their gradual expansion, and we are prepared to provide them in all suitable places, because we think that before very long they will expand in the ordinary way and will become profitable sources of revenue to the Post Office.
  Perhaps it will be well in this connection, as a good deal of interest has been aroused both in this House and outside, that I should say a word or two in reference to the relations between the Post Office and the National Telephone Company. I am very anxious—as, indeed, it must be obvious I should be—to see if possible that the construction work of the National Telephone Company shall be continued uninterruptedly until the end of their lease. I say this upon two grounds. It is clear that that is the only way in which the telephone system when we take it over can be placed upon an efficient basis. The second ground is that I an
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  extremely anxious that the telephone construction staff under the company shall not be dispersed, and shall not be placed at the disadvantage of being dismissed from the service of the company even if they are afterwards taken on by the Post Office. I should like to say that for some time past we have been preparing the way for the handing over of the company to the Post Office, and we have done a good deal in that direction. We have done a very large amount of underground work for the National Telephone Company, and we have done a very large amount of overhead wire construction, amounting to £1,000,000 already. We have in many cases where smaller exchanges were being brought into operation provided that they should be placed at once on Post Office Premises. In all these matters we are preparing for the future. In addition we have of late had a Committee—a very powerful Departmental Committee—surveying, as specimens, certain towns in which the National Telephone Company are carrying on their work, with the view to the more rapid valuation of the plant and, if necessary, antedating the time at which the purchase may be effected. In addition we have had negotiations with the company in order to come to an agreement as far as possible with regard to construction work, and, I am glad to believe, with regard to a proportion of that work, such work as does not involve replacement, that we have come to a substantial agreement. We have not been able to come to agreement with regard to other work which does involve replacement, but I hope, with reasonable suggestions on both sides, we may come to an agreement with regard to that also.
  There is a great deal of exaggeration and anxiety in the minds of many hon. Members and people outside in regard to rumours of a large number of dismissals by the company, whether we come to an agreement or not. I have inquired, and I understand from the company that they are not refusing the ordinary everyday offers of new lines, and so on, and that they have, of course, very naturally, a considerable amount of work. Their maintenance and construction staffs are interchangeable. Of course, there are vacancies on the maintenance staff, and they are filled by the construction staff. I was rather relieved a day or two ago on this matter. There was a meeting to be held in Manchester with reference to this-subject. I made inquiries as to how far

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  there had been dismissals, and I found that only one man had been given notice of dismissal, and that was probably on some personal ground. I wish to allay the natural feeling of anxiety in this matter—The Telephone Company must carry out a large amount of work during the next three years, and so far as possible we are endeavouring to meet the future by present arrangements for continuing on proper lines the construction work. I would venture to say to the Committee that the best solution of the question would be an earlier purchase of the company's undertaking. I have already ventured to raise the case to the company, but I think it ought to be understood that any purchase by the Postmaster-General ought to be carried out on the lines of the agreement of 1905. That is to say, that in the event of a difference at the price the question should be put to arbitration. Of course, we should be prepared to meet the company with regard to profits and goodwill for the intervening period. I must say a big operation of that sort antedating a statutory Parliamentary agreement could not possibly be carried through unless with the general approval of hon. Members, but I believe that support would be forthcoming from hon. Members.
  I will say only one word with reference to the question of wireless telegraphy. That is an enterprise which is making considerable strides. I ventured to prophecy when the Berlin Conference was held, and the Convention come to and largely approved, owing to the policy of our delegates, that so far from being harmful to the extension of wireless telegraphy it would really be to the benefit of the Marconi Company. I am glad to think that since that Convention came into operation they have co-operated with the Postmaster-General, and that instead of their operations being diminished they have been largely increased. My hon. Friends will remember that they said it would be destructive of all their business, and that the Germans' system would go ahead of them if the Convention was carried through. It is rather interesting to know that while the Marconi Company had only 18 stations on German ships at that time, they have no less now than 36 stations on German ships. So far from having less, they have now double the number on German ships. Taking warning by the telegraph system and the telephone system under which the State allowed monopoly to grow up
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  which it subsequently had to buy, we do not intend with reference to wireless telegraphy to allow anything to grow up in the nature of monopoly as against the State. We have already had experimental stations. I opened a little time ago a commercial station at Bolt Head, and in 1912, when the period for which we have promised various licences comes to an end, it will be for the Postmaster-General and the Government of the day to say whether it will be an advantage to take the whole system over into their hands, or whether they should continue to license the various companies. I say to the Committee as regards the question of the future of wireless telegraphy we shall certainly keep the decision in our hands, so that no question of a monopoly can possibly arise.
  Turning from revenue I come to expenditure. The expenditure has increased during the past two years. That is due to three causes—the ordinary natural automatic increase, a considerable increase in the staff, and a very considerable improvement in the pay and conditions of the postal servants. Those causes and the various postal improvements which I have carried through have resulted, I am sorry to say, in this: that the balance at the disposal and handed over to the Treasury as compared with two years ago, is one million pounds less than it was then.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Will the right hon. Gentleman tell us what proportion of money has gone since the right hon. Gentleman came into office to the benefit of the servants of the Post Office, and what proportion to the public in concessions to them?
  Mr. BUXTON: In round figures the concessions due to the Hobhouse Report during the last financial year cost about half a million, rather more this year, and gradually increasing to £650,000, or £700,000. Under Lord Derby's revision there was something like £300,000 to be added to that. So that one way or another in the end those sums will amount to an addition of about a million of money.
  An HON. MEMBER An HON. MEMBER: Is that in four years?
  Mr. BUXTON: When the changes have their full effect. Against that the sum which the Treasury has given me for the benefit of the public amounts to half a million in the last three years.

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  What I was going to say is this: I consider the Treasury in both of these matters have treated me very liberally, and with the unfortunate necessity for increasing taxation during the coming year I cannot press for any postal reforms during the coming year which would involve the expenditure of any very large sums of money. Otherwise there are various reforms which I and the House of Commons would like to see carried out. But in these matters we must to a certain extent cut our coat according to our cloth.
  Mr. J. HENNIKER HEATON: Will the right hon. Gentleman give us some idea as to how the half million is coming to the public?
  Mr. BUXTON: It is a little awkward, if I may say so, to answer these questions in the course of one's speech. I shall be very glad to answer any questions afterwards. What I am going to say will perhaps lead up to the information which the hon. Member desires. The principal portion, or a large portion, of this was due to the improvement in foreign postage. That amounts to about £190,000 a year, giving the weight of an ounce instead of half an ounce, and reducing the second charge that used to be 2½d. for a second ½oz. to l½d., so that whereas before a 2oz. letter cost 10d. to send abroad it now only costs 4d. Then there is the American penny postage—that will cost between £130,000 and £140,000 a year. I have never anticipated a very sudden increase of 100 per cent. or anything of that sort. What I do look for is a satisfactory and steady increase in the postal traffic of the two countries, and that I am glad to think has come about. There is a substantial increase in the number of letters written to America, and from America here. There is an old saying of Lowell's that "this bread cast on these waters comes back before many days and buttered, too, for certain." That is the case with postal improvements, I hope. What I think in these matters is that we want to place our postal reforms on such a basis that in the end they will prove profitable to the State. Then there is the question of Canadian magazine postage, and I am happy to state that that is really growing by leaps and bounds, and that for the last 12 months, as far as we can estimate, no less than 8¼ millions of British magazines have gone to Canada. It was once said that "a man who made
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  two blades of grass grow where only one was grown before" was a benefactor to mankind. I, however, shall be quite content to base my claim on a much lower standard, shall be quite willing—quite content—to go down to posterity as the man who caused two British magazines to be read in Canada instead of one American magazine. Then there is the insured box post, under which jewellery and gold and silver articles can be sent to various Continental countries. We have extended and improved the parcels post to the United States, to Egypt, and to the Argentine, and in regard to a new experiment made a few months ago, there is cash on delivery to various Colonies. Cash on delivery here gives rise to a great deal of alarm on the part of certain sections, and I have no intention, under the circumstances, of introducing or proposing it here. But this is a different matter altogether. This is cash on delivery between certain of our Colonies and England, and I am glad to say it is spreading, although it has only been in operation a few months. The last Return shows that 4,200 parcels were sent from Great Britain to these various Colonies concerned, as against 435 parcels received from them. Therefore, I think it may be said that this cash on delivery is introducing an outlet for British goods of small descriptions amongst our Colonies. On the other hand, there are certain matters in relation to which the Post Office have had to intervene by way of restriction. It was brought to my attention a short time ago that, in consequence of the increasing size of ladies' hats, the parcels post (although the limits were pretty liberal, because we allowed six feet for length and girth) was being infringed. We could not allow this infringement to continue, but I am glad to hear that since then—I do not say it is entirely in consequence—the size of ladies' hats has diminished. Therefore, I hope those who attend matinees and such-like resorts will at all events bless me in their prayers. One other matter: We have always endeavoured to do what we could to restrict the operations of those who send lottery circulars and letters of that character through the post. A Joint Committee was appointed last year, but it was unfortunate, in my opinion, that they did not recommend that greater powers should be given to the Post Office in this connection. However I am glad to think that, in spite of our limitations and restrictions, I made

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  a good haul the other day, when something like 150,000 circulars of a particular description were stamped for postage, representing to the Post Office something like £600, and I was able to confiscate every one of those 150,000 letters, to get £600 for postage, and to see that the morals of the community were protected. I am not going to say how I was able to bring that about. In the first place, I hope it will be a warning to those gentry; and, in the second place, if it is not, I hope to get some more hauls of the same kind. We have always our postal reformers, our postal Oliver Twists, who are always asking for more, and I think the postal reformers, if the hon. Gentleman below the Gangway will allow me to say so, are somewhat too much inclined to pose as hardworking and unappreciated individuals who have to encounter red tape, obscurantism, and general Departmental obstruction. I can assure them that it is not so. The Department is always willing to consider proposals for postal reform if they are of a practical character, but there is an old saying which runs1 to the effect that "anybody can find Genesis, but it takes an able-bodied man to turn up Hosea." Nothing is easier than to suggest reform, but it is much more difficult to carry it out. In the first place, it has to be worked out in detail, and, in the second, and this is a very important element, it has to be seen that it does not conflict with or injuriously affect the unity and simplicity which, after all, are at the bottom of our postal service, and by which alone you can give that regularity, efficiency, and rapidity, which I am glad to think we have got in our postal system. Then also—and this is somewhat important—we have to provide the cash, and I notice that the postal reformers are seldom daunted by considerations of cost or hampered by rules of arithmetic. I had the other day from a postal reformer a proposal suggesting that I could get a quarter of a million of additional revenue by the introduction of a service de luxe in regard to express delivery carried out on the same conditions as express deliveries are carried on now. That would be a very good suggestion if it was practicable, because I am always very glad of either a large or a small sum; but I worked it out, and found that while we have seventeen thousand messengers at present, and deliver somewhat under two million messages in order to make a profit of a quarter
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  of a million, the public would have to send a thousand million express messages in the course of the year, and we should have to employ a hundred thousand additional messengers. I am rather against boy messengers where I can avoid them, and I regretted that I could not accept that proposal. But, on the whole, we do welcome proposals of a practical character, and endeavour as far as we can, subject always to the Treasury—and most Members of the House know what the Treasury is, though I am bound to say they have been very liberal to me—but subject to the Treasury we are open to consider reforms, and I do think, if I may say so, as representing the Department, that the Department really has the confidence of the country both in regard to the question of reform and in regard to the way in which its duties are carried out.
  I had a letter the other day, which I will venture to read to the House. It was written to me, but it was really intended as a compliment for the Department which I represent, but it is of a nature which any head of a Department likes to see, and it certainly gave me gratification for the time being. This letter is from a lady who writes from Liverpool, which is always a very intelligent place. ["Hear, hear."] I notice that the hon. Members for Liverpool cheer that assertion. This lady lost a parcel at Christmas time, and she writes:—
  "I thoroughly appreciate the absolutely tremendous trouble you have, and especially at this time of the year. It is proverbial that the Post Office will simply do anything to please even beyond all reason, and wishes which are not executed are absolutely impossible. If the parcel cannot be recovered I am sure it will be an impossibility."
  I am glad to say the parcel was recovered, and that letter shows, I think, a thorough appreciation of the work of the Department. I think also the fact that the other day the House of Commons threw upon the Post Office very large additional work in connection with old age pensions shows the confidence of the public in the impartiality and efficiency of the Post Office. We had six hundred thousand pensions and more to pay a week, £150,000 to provide in silver, and an addition suddenly fell upon the Post Office of something like thirty million transactions in the year, and I am glad to think that that in no sense interfered in any way with the ordinary operations of the Department and the ordinary regularity and efficiency of the service, and so far as I am able to ascertain there have been no complaints made with regard to the matter at all. Then I should like to say, as I said the other day, when

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  it was stated that some of the sub-postmasters had objected to the work, that that is really not the case. Indeed, I have had many letters from sub-postmasters and sub-postmistresses who are most intimately connected with the work expressing the real gratification that they have themselves shared in bringing some brightness and happiness into the lives and homes of these aged people. It is interesting, I think, also, as showing how public Departments are coming more and more to be utilised, and quite rightly utilised, for public purposes. In the Debate we have had in reference to the Board of Trade, we have seen a great increase of the various and multifarious duties, such as arbitration, conciliation, Labour questions, and so on, which have been thrown upon that Department; and, as regards the Post Office, that also is obviously expanding from time to time. We have had not only such large questions as the whole of the telephone system thrown upon us, but wireless telegraphy and insurance business. These are within the legitimate ordinary sphere of Post Office operations, but outside that sphere we have such matters as old age pensions transferred. Also, among other matters, we have the carrying on of the operations of local licences, and in connection with other matters, such as Labour Bureaux and other questions of social reform, certain duties will be imposed upon us; and, from a national point of view, I think it is an advantage that they should be carried out by the Post Office.
  It is an advantage that the State should have selected such an institution as the means of carrying these matters through, so long as the primary duties of that institution are not interfered with, and that these public functions should be placed under its control and carried out by it. Of course, it thus becomes in a sense something of a monopolist institution, but I do not think that is a real disadvantage from a national point of view. It does, however, seem to affect a certain number of persons in the State, for I myself had a letter—I must quote one other letter—from an irate correspondent the other day, in which he spoke of me as a "bloated, irresponsible monopolist," and when I came to think of it, omitting one of the adjectives as superfluous, I am an irresponsible monopolist; because as Postmaster-General no one can bring an action against me, and I am liable in damages to
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  no single human being. That is the only disadvantage that I can see of what I think otherwise is the immense advantage of throwing these public duties on a public Department such as the Post Office. Let me also add one appeal. In saying that while we are doing what we can for the public, I have ventured of late on more than one occasion to appeal to them to assist me in improving the conditions of service of our postal servants in regard to such matters as earlier posting and earlier closing and later opening. I intend to appeal as regards the reduction of the time of opening for telegraph purposes on Sunday, by which the public would in no way be in danger of losing any of the advantages of the postal system, but they could do a good deal to improve the conditions of service of the Department.
  I now want to turn to another aspect of the Question. I have dealt so far with the Postmaster-General as he deals with the public, but he is also a very large employer of labour—the largest in the country, and the Post Office cannot fail to have an influence for good or for bad on the labour market generally and the rate of wages, and I for one say that that influence ought to be for good and not for bad. There are two classes of servants, those under contractors and those directly employed by the Post Office. As regards contractors, so far as I have had any difficulties with them—and I am glad to say they have been comparatively few—the improved Fair Wages Clause will enable us to deal with them in a satisfactory way and to see that proper wages are paid. But I think I may just add this. There is another class in what are called the sweated industries in which there is, unfortunately, no fair rate of wage. I had last year to institute an experiment in regard to the clothing trade and in regard to the female labour in that trade by fixing a minimum wage, under which I do not allow any of them to be paid. I only introduced it, I frankly say, as an experiment. It is a very difficult problem to solve. It is very difficult to know what rate ought to be fixed. It was done after great consultation with the Board of Trade. I have been blamed for not putting that rate higher. I should like to put that rate higher, but it was admitted that the difficulty in a case of this sort is that you do not want to upset and disorganise the trade, and I think it better to go step by step and gradually improve the rate of pay in

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  those trades, and I am glad to know that the rates of wages received by the women working in those trades are very much larger, in some cases double, than they were receiving before. I really now feel that my effort is somewhat unnecessary, because of the House agreeing to the introduction of these Wages Boards in sweated trades, and it will be unnecessary to deal with this question by Government action. But I venture to say that I have to a certain extent anticipated their action, and the evidence and experience I shall be able to lay before these Wages Boards when they are instituted will be of value to them in arriving at a decision. Then as to the Report of the Royal Commission in regard to spreading the work over the year, I am glad to think that those proposals have been largely anticipated in the Post Office, and that at all events we shall endeavour to carry them out to the fullest possible extent.
  Coming to the postal officials themselves, I have not very much to add to what I have said on at least two occasions. My right hon. Friend opposite asks the amount of advantage to the men from the Parliamentary Commission, and I have already stated that, taking the two Commissions together, about a million a year; but I think it ought to be remembered in this connection that it is not only a question of wages, but it is also to a large extent a question of improved conditions of service, which cannot be measured in money terms, but which in many cases are really more important than the money concerned. Last year we had considerable debate upon the question of classification, and I somewhat regret that I have to bring my Estimates on at the present moment, because I promised last year that I would look into special cases in which special hardship had arisen from the classification which had been proposed, and at an early date I am making a few alterations, especially in regard to some of those places where, under the system of classification proposed by the Committee, and adopted by myself, the result has been a reduction of 3s. These cases, at all events, should be favourably considered. Hon. Members have shown me circulars which they have received in regard to classification, and I have no doubt I shall hear something about it in the course of the evening, and I may have an opportunity, if necessary, of
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  saying a few words in reply. But I have endeavoured to carry out the recommendations of the Committee in regard to this and other matters. To judge by those communications which have been shown to me, it is implied that existing officers have been reduced in their salary. But that is not so. There is no reduction in the maximum of any existing officer. It only applies to a very limited number, and it is due to the particular classifications which had to be carried out, and it only applies to new entrants in the future, and of course all existing and future benefit from the various improvements in conditions to which I have referred already.
  I have had during the past year a good deal of communication with the various associations of postal servants, and I am glad to think that with one exception my relations have been of the most friendly description, and further, the associations, have not only discussed various questions affecting conditions of service with myself, but they have discussed these matters also with what is sometimes called the secretariat, and sometimes the permanent officials, to the advantage of both, and in some matters, such, for instance, as telegraphist cramp, we have co-operated, the associations and the Department, in placing the matter before the Home Office, and I am glad to think we have had telegraphist cramp scheduled as a disease of occupation. I am glad to think, also, again in co-operation, we have had inquiries into such matters as cycling duties, the carrying of loads, stair-climbing, and so on, all of which are matters affecting some section of the service, and which are, in my opinion, far better settled by joint agreement and discussion rather than that there should be any antagonism between the Department and the association. One question which I have placed before the associations is the question whether they think it would be an advantage or a disadvantage to them if the Daylight Bill was put into force. That information I hope I shall get soon. I had a little Daylight Bill of my own in the Secretary's Department, because we asked the staff there whether they would like, instead of having their hours from ten to five, to have them from nine to four. It is interesting to know that out of 843 men on that staff 661 voted for earlier hours, and only 148 against, and 34 were indifferent. So far as we are concerned, though I do not very much

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  approve of the Bill as a Statutory measure, we have put a daylight bill into force ourselves in the summer months.
  The Post Office of course is a business concern. It has a turnover of 22 or 23 millions, representing no less than 5,000 million transactions annually. We have our 40 million inhabitants, and, as I know, I have to deal with 670 Members who have constituencies. I think on the whole the public and the Members are satisfied with the way in which the work is carried out. I have, of course, complaints from time to time, some of them correct and some incorrect. I had a complaint the other day from someone who said he had telegraphed to Grimsby for one live lobster and he had received five. Of course I expressed my great regret. What became of the other four I have not been able to discover. Further than that, I wish to thank hon. Members for the great consideration which they have always given to me personally in regard to the various matters which they bring before me. I am glad to think they appreciate that the Post Office does endeavour to deal with their matters as promptly and efficiently as possible. I was recently told by an hon. Member that the Post Office more promptly acknowledge, sooner answer, and give fuller information than any other Department.
  I am not always, unfortunately, able to meet hon. Members and do everything they desire. The system of the Post Office is very like a puzzle, and you cannot always deal with one part without disorganising or imperilling another, and sometimes I have somewhat difficult questions to solve. The other day I received two letters by the same post from a Member, in which he recommended two men for the same post with the full weight of his authority. That put me in rather a difficult position in regard to the choice as between them. Occasionally hon. Members consider that the Postmaster-General is not only a sort of walking encyclopædia of postal knowledge, but is also a sort of Daniel. I have had Members more than once come to me and say, "About that postal matter, have you been able to do anything about it?" I have said, "Will you just tell me where it was?" He has replied, "I forget the name of the place, and I forget the name of the man, but no doubt you will do what you can." In addition to that there is always a difficulty in regard to local matters, which hon. Mem-
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  bers themselves know full well give rise to so much agitation locally. There are always little questions affecting Little Pedlington, in which there are very large storms in very small teacups, which give rise to great difficulties, and I again desire to thank hon. Members for the great consideration they show in regard to them. I shall like to think if I may that in the time I have had the very great honour and pleasure of being Postmaster-General I have done something to improve the comfort and convenience of the public and the conditions of service of a large number of Government employés, and to bring about more cordial relations between them. I have taken some trouble in going up and down the country and looking into matters as the head of this great Department, and after three and a half years of careful experience I can say emphatically it is as a public Department a credit to the State, and a testimony to the efficiency and loyalty of the public service.
  Sir EDWARD SASSOON moved: "That Item A (Chief Offices) be reduced by £500." It may seem rather churlish and ungracious to move the reduction which stands in my name, but the points which I wish to raise are obviously matter of public interest with regard to which I have had the privilege of receiving an overwhelming amount of support from both sections of the House, and from people representing various branches of the national activity. I am not animated by any sort of hostility to the right hon. Gentleman personally, nor to his Department, which has been able to achieve the impossible in so many instances. The right hon. Gentleman made some passing reference to the reduction effected under the Hobhouse Committee. That reduction has caused a considerable amount of discontent and dissatisfaction, not so much on financial grounds, but rather, as it is alleged—I do not put it higher than that—that the recommendation of that scheme has been carried out somewhat capriciously and arbitrarily. In my own Constituency I hear now and again distant rumblings of discontent. I cannot bring before the Committee any specific or concrete instances of grievances, but I understand that the hon. Members for Haggerston and Shoreditch are both well primed, and I hope and believe the Postmaster-General will be able to expose, if he can, the hollowness of the grievances which I understand exist very materially, not so

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  much in the South or the North as in the Metropolis, and that he will be able to express his intention of remedying those grievances if they really exist.
  The second point I should like to draw his attention to very strongly and strenuously is the inability to do anything to reduce the 25 centime rate between us and France. A rate of 2½d. 200 miles from this country, when you can send a letter for a 1d. 11,000 miles to New Zealand, and when you have only recently reduced the rate to the United States to a 1d., seems an absolute anachronism, more especially as the Postmaster-General must know that the Chambers in Paris are burning with a desire to be met in this respect, and they certainly will reduce the rate the very day the British Government express their intention to do likewise. But the Postmaster-General and the Government say, "We agree that it would be a good thing to do," but they put their objection on the financial ground. I ask whether our national finances under our wonderful fiscal system have been brought to such a low pitch that for the sake of a comparatively exceeding trivial initial loss of something like £70,000 or £80,000 a year the Postmaster-General says he cannot give us this reform because it will cost the Treasury probably for a couple of years that paltry sum. I brought a deputation in June last year before the right hon. Gentleman the Prime Minister and the Chancellor of the Exchequer. One of the arguments used by the Prime Minister then was this—a more jejune or a more unconvincing argument was hardly ever employed by a responsible British statesman in connection with an important matter of this description. He said:—
  "We are perfectly willing to give this concession to France, but what about Holland, Belgium and Germany? If they all ask for similar concessions we cannot refuse."
  Surely if a small nation like Belgium or Holland is able to confront an initial loss of this description a great country like Great Britain, for the sake of consolidating international relations and goodwill, ought to be able to afford the comparatively trumpery figure of £70,000 or £80,000. I should, therefore, urge the Government to again consider this matter, and I urge on the Treasury the necessity of doing something so that the good disposition which is manifested to-day may not by that time have evaporated, and that both this country and France may have the advantage of a cheaper and cheapening postal system.
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  The third point, which I am still more interested in, is the establishment of an Atlantic cable and a State owned and controlled line. I am aware that personally the Postmaster-General is desirous of proceeding with the scheme as soon as he can. My object in pressing this matter upon him is not so much for the purpose of enabling the commercial community to obtain cheap facilities, but because I believe, and I think both sections of the House believe, that it would induce and conduce to the establishment of greater Imperial solidarity between the Mother Country and the Colonies. Of course, the question of cheaper cable communication is not a matter to be despised, but the principal reason why the Committee with which I have the honour to act are desirous to see this scheme carried out is that it will furnish a link in the system of the Pacific cable. The Pacific cable, as the Committee are aware, is an Imperial enterprise. It is due to the patriotic instincts both in Canada and Australia. The Committee would perhaps like to know whether that scheme has been financially a success So far, it has not altogether been a financial success, but I shall presently refer to that point. What I want to impress upon the Committee at the present moment is that if the State—the Imperial concern altogether—if the Empire went in for this Atlantic cable it would involve practically no risk to the ratepayers of the Empire. I will tell the Committee why: Because the price of cables is very much cheaper than it used to be owing to improvements, scientific methods, and so on. The second thing is that the cable would have enough, and more than enough, to do, so that I cannot conceive that a State cable between here and Canada can possibly be said to represent any risk, either to the British or to the Colonial ratepayer. But so far from representing a risk, I think it would be a benefit to the two classes of taxpayers. Although the Pacific cable shows a certain loss in its working, it does not show quite the loss which is apparent on the face of the accounts. If you link up the Pacific cable by starting the cable from Canada, which was the original idea, you will not only give the Pacific cable system a chance of showing what it is able to do on proper commercial lines, but you will give an impetus to the idea of an "allied" cable route which will be of enormous advantage.
  I wish to refer to the financial prospects of the Pacific cable scheme. The present

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  accounts nominally show a loss of between £60,000 and £65,000 a year, but in that item is included no only interest at a substantial rate, but interest on a very substantial sum for the amortisation and sinking fund. I had a calculation made out, which shows that really and truly not more than a loss of £30,000 accrues upon the working of the Pacific cable. But you have to consider the enormous advantage which the co-partnery of this Empire have to gain in the establishment of this Imperial concern. Do the Committee know how much money is saved to the Colonies in the payment of subsidies to cable companies or to what extent the comparatively low rate of cableage has been brought about by the establishment of the Pacific cable. I would, therefore, urge as strongly as I can on the Prime Minister to meet in the promptest possible manner the advances made by the Canadian Postmaster-General. The Government are aware of the very important meeting that was held not very long ago at the Mansion House to which every self-governing Colony sent representatives, and which expressed the earnest desire that this Atlantic cable might be undertaken. Every single Colony is burning with the desire to be allowed to participate in the obligations and responsibilities, and to share in the privileges and advantages of this Imperial cable enterprise. I hope the Committee will not be terrified by the idea that I am suggesting that the State should go into a scheme for taking away the rights of the cable companies. No such thing as that is in my view. What I wish the State to do is, when in future granting landing rights to cable companies, to make such stipulations and provisions as will enable the State to gather into its hands, gradually, of course, the cables which are now managed by private enterprise. Can the Committee conceive of the Post Office handing over the carrying of letters to private companies? I think there is nobody who would suggest for a moment that it would be a good thing to hand over the administration of the Post Office to the hands of private companies. Then why should the question of cables, which are, after all, the nerves and sinews of Imperial consolidation, and after the magnificent response we had from the Colonies a few months ago, not only in regard to Imperial consolidation, but national defence—why should the matter of cables be allowed indefinitely or permanently to remain in the hands of private companies? That
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  is a thing which no House of Commons should contemplate with equanimity, I was very glad to see that the Postmaster-General is alive to the fact that unless he and his Department take steps in good time to safeguard the interests of the State he and his successors will find themselves in the same plight and sorry predicament which existed when the State bought up the telegraph lines of this country. It is a matter of common knowledge that the State had to pay two or three times what the telegraph lines cost because in the drawing up of the agreements by which these lines were allowed to be extended provision was not made with respect to the terms on which the State might ultimately acquire them.
  I want to refer to the question of Indian deferred cable rates. An Interdepartmental Committee which inquired into this matter a few years ago strongly suggested a system of deferred cable rates between India and England. I understand that the India Office have communicated with the companies and made certain proposals on this matter. It will be my duty when a favourable opportunity occurs to ventilate the subject again in this House. I hope that the Postmaster-General, who has shown great energy in the administration of his Department, will signalise the occupancy of his office by enabling not only British magazines to be more largely read in Canada than at present, but that he will enable many humble homes in this country to send cable messages to their relatives abroad who may be their bread-winners, and to whom cabling at present is absolutely a matter of impossibility. I will only mention to the Committee that neither Germany nor France have shown any slackness in the making of provision for cheap cable rates. A cable message can be sent from France to the uttermost confines of Algiers at ½d. per word. Germany has done the same thing with respect to her colonies, as far as South Africa is concerned. I therefore beg the Committee to remember that the population of America is increasing every year by leaps and bounds. We in this country have to contemplate, unfortunately, no such accretion of economic wealth to the resources of our country. You send away every year some of the best of your raw materials—some of the most vigorous of the manhood and womanhood of the country. I wish you to make it worth their while to keep in touch with the Old Country by enabling them

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  to have cheaper and more regular means of communication, and when you have done so you will have builded better than you knew. I beg to move.
  Amendment proposed: "That Item A be reduced by £500."—[Sir Edward Sassoon.]
  Mr. T. SUMMERBELL: I wish to congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on the very interesting statement which he has made to-day, and on the information which he has given as to prospective reforms. We all agree that he is certainly in charge of one of the finest and most important Departments of State, which is by far the largest employer of labour, and I think you will agree that, so far as the staff of the Department over which the right hon. Gentleman presides is concerned, from an intellectual standpoint they are a staff worthy of every consideration. He has indicated here that the Postal Department is still handing over to the taxpayers of this country a very handsome profit in spite of the great depression. Though the Postmaster-General is able to indicate that for a period of something like six years the employés will have received an increase of pay equal to about £1,000,000 and the public will have received concessions equal to about £500,000—a matter at which we all rejoice—yet I hope neither the right hon. Gentleman nor this House will put forward the idea that the maximum has been reached so far as the employés in the postal service are concerned. When we have a man starting with a minimum of about 17s. a week with a prospect of attaining a maximum of 25s. I do not think anyone will be prepared to assert that it is an ideal likely to encourage the best young men of this country to enter the postal service.
  Mr. BUXTON: It was in reference to the decision of the Parliamentary Committee I stated so much this year, and the maximum would be so much. I was referring solely to that and not to the general question of maximum.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: I quite concede the point raised by the right hon. Gentleman. He stated the ultimate result would be a million conceded to the employés. What I was saying was that I hoped this House would not arrive at a conclusion that, although that concession has been made, the ideal had been reached, and that as long as you had young men starting at
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  17s. a week in the postal service with a maximum of 25s. per week, we in this House could not consider such a state of things at all satisfactory. A very large profit is made every year. We have no right to pay these low wages, and to declare this profit as we are doing at the present moment. In regard to classification, I was very pleased to hear the right hon. Gentleman state to-day that he had intended, but time would not permit him, to make a statement to this House in regard to many of the post offices down in the country that had been subject to very severe reduction due to the Report of the Committee a year ago, but that in a short time he intended to make a statement to the House on the subject.
  Mr. BUXTON: It will be published in the ordinary way.
  Mr. SUMMERBELL: I take it then I shall have the opportunity of discussing it, and I proceed now with my remarks in anticipation as to one or two items which I have got in my mind, and which will be at all events dealt with I hope when the right hon. Gentleman makes his statement to the House. The findings of the Committee I consider are most unsatisfactory. The Committee have decided in regard to, the payment of wages according to the volume of work on the unit system and the cost of living. These are the two grounds on which they decide what are the wages that are to be paid. I find that since the Committee's report was made, according to very reliable information, something like 900 post offices down in the country have suffered a reduction of wages. I do not know whether I am right or not. At all events there are a large number of Members in this House, and also many people outside the House I think, who, when the Committee made their recommendations, fully anticipated that instead of there being reduction there would practically be an increase all along the line. Whether that be right or not, we do know that something like 900 post offices have suffered reduction. Supposing you take the question of cost of living. The right hon. Gentleman in reply to a communication last year stated:—
  "I may say yon cannot get an absolute denomination. You cannot reduce it possibly to an absolutely common denominator. We have gone on the system of putting up where the cost of living is specially high, and putting down where it is specially low."
  In regard to this cost of living they have taken the Board of Trade Report up and down the country. I am prepared to assert here to-day that so far as that

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  Report is concerned it is inaccurate in many cases, and easily proved to be so. The position is this. My own town is a case in point, and I can prove it to be inaccurate in reference to that town, especially in regard to the question of rent, which is one of the most important matters in the cost of living, and if I can prove it to be inaccurate in one particular it is fair to assume that it will be inaccurate in many other particulars. This Report, on which the wages are fixed by the Postal Department, I consider unfair in the extreme. Personally I think that before finally agreeing to the reduction of the wages of postal employés based upon this Report further investigation ought to take place. I asked that it should take place some time ago, but up to the present no satisfactory results have ensued.
  There is one case in point which I may give so far as this particular question is concerned. In that Report it is stated that in the ordinary residential quarters of the town I represent two-roomed tenements can be got from 2s. 6d. to 3s. 6d. a week, and three-roomed tenements from 3s. 6d. to 5s. per week. Yet in the same Report reference is made to the slum area in which our corporation has carried out a housing scheme, and it is stated that the rents there are for two-roomed tenements 3s. 9d. to 4s., and three-roomed tenements 4s. 9d. to 5s. per week, an increase in both cases. These tenements are carried on at a considerable debit balance every year. Yet these tenements, which are stated at a higher price than what it is said you can get tenements for in the residential parts of the town, are not paying their way, so that on the face of it these other rents must be absolutely inaccurate which they are. This is the Report of the Postal Department as to the cost of living, as a result of which many of the postal employés up and down the country have suffered a most unfair reduction of wages. I know that the Postmaster-General lays great stress on the limitation of the employés to whom it applies, but in such a big system as the postal system you have got fresh employés every week since this Report was issued, and you have large numbers of employés who have suffered large reductions.
  The unit system is a system that I cannot possibly comprehend, and I cannot understand why the Committee made such a recommendation to this House. So far as that is concerned, I may say that the right hon. Gentleman has got my fullest
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  sympathy for having such a recommendation placed around his neck, and having to put it into operation. The unit system or volume of work is, after the cost of living, the second guide in regard to wages that should be paid. A money order counts 10 units, as against one unit for a letter. Anyone can readily see that if you go to a naval or garrison town or port you will find probably in the Post Office in that particular town a large volume of work appertaining to money orders, and these count for 10 units as against one unit for a letter. Go to another town where money orders are few, and yet the clerk behind the counter is occupied as much every day as the clerk in the town where money orders are plentiful, and he works the same number of hours. Yet according to the unit system the one man's wages have gone up and the other man's wages have gone down. It is an unfair system altogether, and ought to be changed at the earliest possible moment. I cannot see why the men should be governed by such a system. I cannot see why the ordinary rules should not prevail, and men be paid for their work the same as in practically all walks of life.
  Take another case, that of a place like York, which is not a very large town but is a receiving centre. It receives letters from Darlington, Middlesbrough, Stockton, Hartlepool, and all the towns round about. It means nothing extra to the man in the street. He does not handle them at all. The letters are received and sent on. I am not aware that there is any greater volume of work there, yet according to this system these men in York get credit for all these things received from other towns. Such a system is totally unfair. I appeal to the Postmaster-General not to be content with this system which has been placed on his shoulders by this singular Committee. He has got my sympathy, and I hope he will realise that the whole thing is most unfair, and is not likely to bring about that state of contentment that we know the right hon. Gentleman would like to see prevail. I ask at all events that this system shall be changed at the earliest possible moment. There is one other matter that I wish to refer to. I wish to make an appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to see whether it is within his province to deal with the question of the civil rights of the postal employés. I stated a short time ago that the right hon. Gentleman presided over what is the finest Department of the State. Certainly he has got in his service as fine a class of

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  employés as any Department is in possession of at the present time. Many of them are underpaid; many of them work under unfair conditions; but to further penalise these men as they are penalised to-day in regard to their political freedom, I say is most unfair. I do appeal to the right hon. Gentleman and to this House to face this question, in order to give to the postal employés privileges similar to those enjoyed by those engaged in other walks of life, and that they shall have liberty to participate in municipal and political elections, and in reforms appertaining to their municipal or national welfare. I cannot see, and have never been able to see, why any Government should penalise men simply because they are employés of the Government, and that they should be denied what prevails among high officials, who do participate in local and national elections. I do not see why the humble workers should be penalised any more than those I have indicated. Then, in regard to the General Post Office messengers. I admit that there is not a large number of them, only something like 61, but their duties are somewhat varied and of a confidential character. Now, these men have had no change in their maximum pay for 40 years. They have made many appeals, but they have all been ignored. They have asked for an opportunity of stating their case before the right hon. Gentleman, and they petitioned in 1906, but there has been no response. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to give the representatives of this section an opportunity of stating their case before him, and I feel assured, if he does so, much friction will be removed and that greater satisfaction will prevail. There is also the question of sub-postmasters. I understand that certain alterations have taken place with regard to a large number of these men, and to remedy their grievances they ask that the items "letters delivered and parcels delivered" ought to be inserted in the new scale of pay, and credited to those offices dealing with such work. Further, they ask that instead of triennial examinations there should be biennial examinations, just as prevails with offices in our London area. In regard to the case of Mr. Dick, about whom another hon. Member intends to speak, I shall simply observe that I understand this gentleman was not informed as to the allegations against him, and that he was not given a fair trial, or
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  that, at all events, he was not allowed to state his case in defence. I would observe that if the statements given to me are correct—I am not prepared to assert that they are—then I hope the Postmaster-General will see to it that in all cases of a similar character where a man is being penalised, it should be seen that he is told the allegations made against him, that he should know the causes which have led to his being penalised, and that he should be given in every case an opportunity of making a statement in defence of himself. I will only conclude as I began, by expressing my appreciation of the very interesting statement of the Postmaster-General, and I only hope that the points which I have raised will receive his consideration.
  Mr. SCOTT DICKSON: I join with the hon. Member who has just sat down in the sympathetic terms with which he referred to the able and interesting statement of the Postmaster-General. There are one or two points to which I wish to call the attention of the right hon. Gentleman. They are connected with the staffs not only in Glasgow but in other large towns of the country. One point has reference to the maximum wages given to the staffs in some of the large towns. The complaint with reference to this is referred to in paragraph 214 of the Hobhouse Report. A general increase of 2s. was to be allowed to the London staff, and I have communications from six of the leading large towns of the country, and particularly Glasgow, pointing out that there has been no increase in their case from 1890, while, on the other hand, the cost of living is very considerably increased. While in London they agree that the cost of living is higher than in Glasgow by 6 per cent., yet there is a difference of about 16 per cent. in the wages which are allowed, and they ask, therefore, that the matter should at least be inquired into. I do not understand them to put it higher than that. They say that in the increase which has been given, not sufficient cognisance has been taken of the fact that there is a very considerable increase in the cost of living in the larger towns, and that, therefore, some increase should be given to the staffs in those towns, particularly to the staff in Glasgow. According to my information, there has been some increase given to the female employés, but no increase has been given to the male employés, and there is a sense of grievance in that respect, which seems to me to be

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  justified, if the figures given here are correct. Perhaps the right hon. Gentleman will be kind enough to consider the matter if he has not already done so. I am quite certain that if he finds justification for complaint, a remedy will be given for it. May I also say that the question of civil rights, which the hon. Member below the Gangway referred to, seems not to be quite fully understood by members of the staff. I observe in the Hobhouse Report that paragraphs 10 to 14 state that the Post Office staff is treated in this respect just as are other Civil servants so far as interference in municipal or political elections is concerned. There is undoubtedly a feeling among the Post Office staff that in this respect they are treated more hardly than other members of the Civil Service, but, as I have pointed out, the Hobhouse Report shows that this is a misunderstanding on their part. Paragraph 11 of the Report states that the rules applicable to the Post Office service were exactly similar in this matter to those which apply to other Civil servants as far as municipal and national elections are concerned, and if that be so they have no ground of complaint. I have mentioned this point, because I do not think it is understood by certain members of the staff, who have made representations to me on the subject. Another point is this. There is a great deal of uneasiness on the part of clerical employés as to the arrangements which are likely to be made by the Telephone Company, but I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman will do what he can in any arrangements made with the company to see that there are no serious dismissals of employés already on their staff.
  Mr. BUXTON: What does the right hon. Gentleman mean?
  Mr. SCOTT DICKSON: I mean that there shall be no serious dismissals by the Telephone Company of members of their staff. I have had communications with the right hon. Gentleman on the subject, and all I desire is that so far as possible he will use his influence in the event of any changes that may be made to see that dismissals from employment of members of the staff of the company will, as far as far as possible, be avoided. I do not raise the matter in any controversial spirit at all, because I am quite satisfied that the right hon. Gentleman is desirous of meeting the wishes of the staff in every reasonable way, and I trust that the matters
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  which I have brought before him will receive his favourable consideration.
  Mr. MUNRO FERGUSON: In regard to the maximum wages in London and in Edinburgh in the telegraph department, I would point out that there is a very considerable difference in the maximum, the difference being £24 a year as against Edinburgh. It cannot be denied that the cost of living in Edinburgh is cheaper than in London, especially as to house rent, but the statistics of the Board of Trade show that living in London is only 2 per cent. higher than it is in Edinburgh. I think therefore, these facts do constitute a fair case for inquiry. The right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster-General stated that the chances of promotion had been worsened in the Central Telegraph Office, and this was the reason for granting an increase.
  Mr. BUXTON: I stated the Committee said so.
  Mr. MUNRO FERGUSON: I understand that in the Debate the Postmaster-General quoted that part of the Report which said that the increase was given for that reason.
  Mr. BUXTON: I only stated that the Committee said so.
  Mr. MUNRO FERGUSON: At any rate, I am told that in Edinburgh also the rate of promotion is very slow. There are about 50 men out of 153 with the maximum wage, and the number suitable for promotion annually is only two, which does not seem to be very fast progress in that department. I do not often bring up the question of remuneration of Civil servants in this House, and as regards the political treatment to which the hon. Gentleman opposite says they are subject, for my part I find that there is sufficient political freedom amongst Civil servants to enable them on all occasions to bring pressure to bear. In fact, I doubt whether any class of the community can exercise so much influence in a closely contested election as Civil servants. The ordinary working man is not in it with them. I remember that a former Postmaster-General said on one occasion that if his staff exercised so much pressure on candidates they would have to consider the question of disestablishing Civil servants. I think on that occasion I expressed my general approval of his remarks, and I do not know that since I have benefited much from the votes of postal servants in my Constituency. I

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  doubt whether political freedom is one of the most pressing necessities of the Post Office staff in respect of obtaining full consideration for any just claims they may have to make. I doubt whether any class of the community has such able advocates in this House as the staff of the Post Office. I only brought up this point because it is a matter between one district and another which I think may fairly be brought to the notice of the Post Office.
  I should also like to ask my right hon. Friend whether there is likely to be any development of the underground telegraph system of cables to Scotland. I believe the cable is now on the point of entering Edinburgh. There was some divergence of views between the Post Office and Edinburgh as to the proper route to take which has unfortunately delayed the introduction of the cable. I trust that that difficulty may soon be at an end, and that we shall have the underground cable in the city. It is manifest that in Scotland more particularly, owing to the climatic conditions, that this matter of underground cable communication is of the most supreme importance to the business of the country. I would urge that the system should be carried further north, and I would ask my right hon. Friend whether he contemplates any further extension of the cable system northwards. I should like to thank him for what he has done in promoting the telephone trunk lines north of Inverness through the Highlands, and all the more because the extension of those lines in the thinly populated districts is of very great importance to the development of the country, particularly during the busy tourist season. I thank him for what he has done, and I would most earnestly press upon him to consider the great need for the extension of the cable system further north than is contemplated by the initial scheme.
  Mr. JAMES O'CONNOR (Wicklow, W): I congratulate the right hon. Gentleman upon the very interesting statement he has made to the House. I wish to ask for some explanation of his proposal to reduce the wages of the postmen in 900 offices in Great Britain and Ireland. He made a passing allusion to the proposed reduction by saying that it would affect only future entrants to the positions. Future entrants will be coming on every day, and eventually they will number 8,000 men. I think it is a very serious proposal
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  on the part of the Postmaster-General to reduce the wages of 8,000 men, although the reduction will not take place all at once. Judging from the office in Ireland which the Postmaster-General purposes to reduce, I think there is hardly any justification for so sweeping a reduction in the wages of men whose wages are already goodness knows low enough. I know in Greystones and Rathdrum, and several other portions of my Constituency the postmen cannot afford to lose even a 1s. a week, while in some cases the reduction would amount to about 3s. per week. I should like to know from the Postmaster-General on what authority he has made or proposes to make these reductions?
  Is there anything in the Hobhouse Committee Report to justify him in reducing the wages of 8,000 prospective postmen? I think in the whole of the report there is not the slightest suggestion that any such reduction should be made. On the contrary, I believe, and I think it will be borne out by some Members who are on that Committee, that it was the clear intention of the Hobhouse Committee that an increase of wages should take place rather than any reduction in the case of postal servants. If there is nothing in the Hobhouse Report to justify the serious reduction in the wages of those poor men, because a 1s. to a postman is a great deal more than 5s. to other persons employed in the service, there must be some reason, and I should be very glad if the Postmaster-General would tell us. I presume before those reductions were decided upon the Postmaster-General instituted inquiries in every one of those 900 offices as to whether a reduction might or might not be made in those places. I would ask him did he make inquiries, is it a fact that there were 100 postmasters asked, and that the great majority who were applied to decided that increase ought to be made instead of reduction? That is an important point which I hope the right hon. Gentleman will address himself to when he comes to reply.
  There is another matter I wish to bring before the House. For some time past complaints have been made about auxiliary work in Ireland. I myself last year or the year before brought under the notice of the right hon. Gentleman the widespread grievance as to auxiliary labour that exists in Ireland. I think he promised to apply some remedy to it. I think he promised to reduce the amount of auxiliary labour, and I believe some feeble attempt has

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  been made to place auxiliary postmen upon an established basis, but very little in that way has been done. I suggest that he ought at least to reduce auxiliary labour in Ireland by 25 per cent. I hope before the Estimates come up next year he will be able to say he has reduced auxiliary labour in Ireland by at least 25 per cent. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will give his attention to the points which I have made. First of all, was there any authority in the Hobhouse Report that a postman's wages should be reduced, and, secondly, is it a fact that the postmasters who were applied to to give their view of the necessity for reducing wages that the majority reported in favour of an increase. I hope as well that he will take care to reduce the auxiliary labour in Ireland.
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: After all the kind things that have been said of the speech of the right hon. Gentleman I will endeavour to make my remarks as kindly as possible, as befits the speech. Before I deal with the case of Mr. Dicks I want to emphasise the point referred to by the right hon. Member for Central Glasgow in regard to the constructional staff of the National Telephone Company, and I want a little more satisfaction if I can get it in regard to the position of that constructional staff. The constructional staff in the National Telephone Company comprises nearly 6,000 men. I took the trouble to ascertain the nature of the employment of those men. A thousand of them are labourers, more or less skilled; 2,300 are linesmen, skilled hands; 700 firemen, 400 cable-joiners, 1,000 switchers and board staff, 400 electricians. Their wages range from 22s. to 50s. per week. They are a skilled staff and they are men who have been in the employment of the National Telephone Company for many years past. Their work has been formed for them, and they for the work. If they were thrown out of employment owing to the arrangement between the Post Office and the Telephone Company very great hardship would be inflicted on those men. I understand the late Postmaster-General, before I was in this House, when he made a statement relating to this agreement, distinctly laid it down he did not intend anybody should lose his employment in consequence of the taking over of the Telephone Company by the State.
  Undoubtedly there was a certain number of dismissals last year. It is quite true, as the Postmaster-General told us a few months ago, referring to a meet-
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  ing at Manchester, that no dismissals have taken place during the last few months. The reason for that is this: that when the dismissals began in autumn of last year an agitation, and, I think, a legitimate agitation, sprang up amongst those men. Representations were made to the Postmaster-General and to the National Telephone Company, and the National Telephone Company agreed and decided that no dismissals should take place during the winter months. That is why the Postmaster-General was able to tell us that only one dismissal had taken place in the Manchester district during the winter months. The agreement was that no dismissal took place during the winter months, a period supposed to expire on the 31st March. If those dismissals are to take place there will be very great hardships on the men, who will not be able to get other employment, because there is only one employer for telephone work; there is no rival company. Nobody is putting up constructional telephone work. There will be very great hardship on the men who were entitled to no pension and cannot turn very easily to any other kind of work, and who will not be able to get anything like the amount of wage of 30s., 40s., or 50s. in any other business. The reason for this difficulty, as I understand it, is that the National Telephone Company is not going to undertake any new constructional work which will not show a profit before the end of 1911.
  I put this to the Postmaster-General, that he, on behalf of the State, is responsible for the welfare of those men. If the State had not agreed to take over the National Telephone Company those men would have gone on working. All constructional work would have been continued on the National Telephone Company, therefore the State, in its agreement with the National Telephone Company, ought to have made some arrangement for the future of those men. I want to call the Committee's attention to the fact that in all other cases the staffs have been properly looked after. We heard the other day from the President of the Board of Trade, when he was discussing with the railway company forms of amalgamation, one of the things he was most careful about was that no man should be dismissed, no man should suffer in his employment, because of the amalgamation and a possible reduction of the staff. When the Port of London Bill was before us last Session distinct arrangements were made that the men in the employ of the various

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  dock companies should not suffer because of the amalgamation. Again, a few years ago, when the Water Board took over the work of the water companies, similar provisions were made. Whether it was an oversight or not I cannot say, but when the agreement between the Telephone Company and the Post Office was concluded no definite arrangements were made to take over the constructional staff of the Company. I venture to suggest that these men were worse treated than the plant itself, because arrangements were made for taking over the plant and machinery. The Postmaster-General has told us this afternoon that he desires to be a model employer. I agree that the State should be a model employer, but equally the State should be a model purchaser. We are all agreed now on the policy of the purchase of the Telephone Company by the State; but if the State is going to purchase, as it is, the works and establishment of the National Telephone Company, it should be a model purchaser, and make such arrangements as will safeguard the interests of these men.
  May I also, as representing a commercial constituency, say a word in reference to the users of the telephone. If this constructional work between now and 1911 is to be modified—as we know it is, from the declarations of the chairman of the National Telephone Company—there must be a slackening off in the facilities afforded to the general public for the extension of the telephone system. That slackening has already begun, and it is bound to go on. A constituent of mine has communicated with me in regard to the difficulty of getting a telephone fixed to his house some distance outside Manchester. I wrote to the Postmaster - General—not personally, but to the Department—and, an inspector having been sent down, I had an official letter from the Post Office only ten days ago stating that nothing could be done for the extension of the telephone to this particular house until 1912, when the Post Office took over the constructional work of the Telephone Company. If that is the case in Manchester, I am certain that it is the case in a large number of other districts also. I have had the benefit of seeing some of the representatives of the National Telephone Company's Employés' Association. I asked them whether they would give me some instances (in order that I might put them before the Commit-
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  tee) where constructional work was being delayed owing to this arrangement between the company and the Post Office, but they replied—and I think the Committee will agree that they replied rightly—that they were confidential servants, and could not divulge facts which came to their knowledge confidentially. I admire them for declining to give instances; but, at any rate, I have given the Postmaster-General one case, and on behalf of the commercial community and of the 6,000 men concerned I ask that he should effect some arrangement on the point. It has been suggested that he should, if possible, ante-date the period for the completion of the purchase. I believe that that would meet with the approval of all sections of the House, as the men would then be taken over and would come under the model employer whom I see before me. May I also ask that when he is taking them over he should make arrangements so that the period which they have served with the National Telephone Company—which, after all, is a semi-national service—should be counted to them for pension as if they had been employed by the State? They have been doing the same work and receiving certainly not higher wages than Civil servants, and it would be only fair, when the State for its own purposes and to improve the system is taking over the company, that the staff should be put upon the same basis in all respects as if they had been for years past under the model employer.
  Now I come to the more difficult question of Mr. Dick. Mr. Dick is a young man who has been in the employment of the Post Office for some few years as a sorter at Glasgow. He lived with his parents, both of whom are over 70 years of age; he bears an absolutely unimpeachable reputation, and has a character from the minister of his parish. But unfortunately for his position in the Post Office he cast a favourable eye on a young lady in the telegraph department. The eye was a perfectly moral eye and a perfectly justifiable eye; the feeling ripened into an attachment which the Committee will be pleased to know will very soon result in the young lady becoming Mrs. Dick. I will not give the name of the lady, but throughout the correspondence she has been called Miss M. Unfortunately Mr. M., the father of the lady, did not appreciate Mr. Dick as a son-in-law, and he wrote to the Postmaster-General complaining of the attentions of this gentleman to his

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  daughter. One day in October, 1906, Mr. Dick was called into his superior's office, when the following note was read to him:—
  "The Postmaster-General views with displeasure Mr. Dick's actions to Miss M. and in writing two letters, one to her father, and one to her sister. He is to be transferred at his own cost to another office of similar scale as Glasgow on the first opportunity, Any further discreditable conduct will be dealt with severely."
  On that, he was transferred to Manchester, and thus the case came under my own personal knowledge. The transfer papers were headed
  "For discreditable conduct to Miss M., learner, Stirling, and for writing two letters, one to her father, and one to her sister."
  That is the charge against this unfortunate young man, who bears an absolutely good character, and for that "discreditable conduct" he is transferred from his home, sent to Manchester, and placed at the bottom of the class. Anybody who knows Post Office régime will understand what that means to a man. It is not merely a transfer from the pleasure of living in Glasgow to the pleasure of living at Manchester, but it stops his promotion, and he has against him that statement of "discreditable conduct to Miss M." After he had been at Manchester for some time Mr. Dick sought an interview, and asked what the discreditable conduct was. Unfortunately, Mr. M. was not satisfied with the transfer, because Mr. Dick chose to go on writing letters to Miss M. But is there any reason—I want to ask this question of the model employer—why Mr. Dick should not write letters to Miss M.? They are perfectly proper letters. I believe the Postmaster-General has them, and if there is a single improper sentence in the letters let him produce them, and say what is wrong. I am quite prepared to admit that Mr. Dick wrote a very fiery letter to Miss M.'s father, but I am quite certain that I should, and in all probability the Postmaster-General himself would have done the same under similar circumstances. When I put a question in the House last autumn the Postmaster-General stated that the circumstances were so well known that it would be a mere form of formality to comply with the Tweedmouth rule.
  Here I come to a much more important matter than Mr. Dick and his love affairs, and that is the breach by the Post Office of the Tweedmouth rule relating to punishments. Mr. Dick's is only a case which has enabled us to find out how the Post Office is carrying out its own rules
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  and regulations. The Tweedmouth rule to which I refer is:—
  "We understand that, before the punishment of an officer, the precise nature of the charges brought against him is explained to him in writing, and that he is allowed to make, on his own behalf, a written explanation. This rule, which secures officers from unjust treatment, should be strictly adhered to."
  In this case that rule was distinctly not adhered to. No statement of the charges brought against Mr. Dick was ever made in writing, nor was any opportunity ever given him to place before the Postmaster-General or the officials an answer in writing. He was simply called into his superior's office, when the note which I have quoted was read to him, and then he was transferred to Manchester. I need not weary the Committee with the correspondence between Mr. Dick and the Post Office, or between the Postal Clerks' Association, who took the matter up on his behalf, and the Department. But when I asked the Postmaster-General in October last whether he had complied with the recommendation of the Tweedmouth Committee, and whether he would give Mr. Dick a chance of answering these charges, even two-and-a-half years after his transfer, the right hon. Gentleman replied:—
  "The rule referred to by the Tweedmouth Committee is still in force. The circumstances leading to Mr. Dick's transfer from Glasgow were of a kind so completely within his own knowledge that the application of the rule became a mere formality, which could not have affected the result. It should, nevertheless, have been complied with. The omission has since been repaired; and Mr. Dick has defended himself verbally and in writing without convincing me that he was treated unjustly."
  I hope that this evening we shall have an opportunity of ascertaining how the Postmaster-General was convinced that Mr. Dick was not treated unfairly. The reply continued:—
  "Mr. Dick's conduct since his transfer has been satisfactory; and he was informed more than a year ago that I was prepared to sanction, under certain conditions, his re-transfer to Glasgow."
  That is rather curious, as Mr. and Miss M. are still living in the neighbourhood of Glasgow. What were the conditions on which the Postmaster-General was prepared to re-transfer Mr. Dick? First of all, he was to go back at his own expense; and, secondly, he was to have no more "discreditable conduct" with regard to Miss M. The "discreditable conduct," it must be remembered, means writing love letters. Therefore, apparently the Postmaster-General is going to establish a rule that postal clerks may not write love letters to the ladies of their choice. An hon. Friend suggests, except under the right hon. Gentleman's supervision. That

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  would be imposing upon him, model employer as he is, a far greater responsibility than I should have thought he would have cared to undertake. Possibly that is the reason why he is asking for the appointment of an Under-Secretary to assist him in his work. Doubtless the young gentleman who is appointed will have the supervision of the amatory department of the Post Office. But seriously—because it is a serious matter—the whole question has arisen because the Post Office chose to take note of a letter written to them by an outside individual regarding the outside conduct of one of their postal servants. What right has the Post Office to intervene because the father of this young woman chooses to come forward and say, "I object to this man paying attention to my daughter. I object to his meeting her in the street. I object to the influence he has over her." If this is to go on we shall have mothers writing letters, and saying to the Postmaster-General, "Mr. So-and-So has been paying attentions to my daughter, but he is not now coming forward. Will you kindly intervene in regard to this negative young man, as you intervened in the case of the rather too positive young man?" I want the House to note how the Postmaster-General has placed himself entirely in the hands of Mr. M. While Mr. Dick was at Manchester, miles and miles away from the object of his affections, Mr. M. went on writing to Mr. Dick, and in 1907 he sent him a letter of warning, as follows:—
  "The postal authorities fully expected, now that you had been removed to Manchester, that my daughter might regain her freedom from your evil influence."
  That is rather strong.
  "But so long as she continued to go between Stirling and Dunblane and frequent your people almost daily—"
  So that this unfortunate young lady is not allowed even to go and see the father and mother of Mr. Dick—
  "…should this not cease at once I will certainly report the matter to the Postmaster-General as requested.
  "P.S.—A copy of this letter will be sent to the Postmaster-General along with my letter of complaint."
  In April this young man was sent a further letter from the Post Office. I would like to draw the Postmaster-General's attention to this:—
  "Mr. Dick can be informed that a further letter has been received from Mr. M. complaining of his conduct in relation to Miss M. since his transfer to Manchester, and he should be warned that unless he can arrange his private affairs in such a matter that the Department is not troubled with them in future, the consequences to him may be very serious."
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  Well, but really, it is a case when the Postmaster-General chooses to listen to tittle-tattle of this kind emanating from this Miss M.'s father. This young man was doing his work to the satisfaction of his superiors in Manchester, and he is to be warned that if Mr. M. cannot be kept quiet, the consequences to himself will be very serious. Well, now, the Postmaster-General—and I want to be perfectly fair in this matter—handed the matter over to one of his senior officials to look into it. The young man was brought up to London in November, 1907, and he was interviewed by Mr. Norway, who, I believe, is one of the senior officials at the General Post Office. Mr. Dick was courteously treated. He was asked various questions. Immediately after that interview Mr. Dick wrote down, as far as he could from memory, what had taken place. Mr. Norway put certain questions to him. He was asked: "Was there no ground for Mr. M.'s complaint to the Department?" You will notice the inquisitorial character of these questions put by the officials to the young Post Office clerk brought up from Manchester to be interrogated. "Was there any police case in connection with the affair (at Stirling)?" There is absolutely no foundation for that question. What right had any official of the Post Office to put a question of this kind to this young man? There was no police case. There was, I quite admit, a disturbance in the street at Stirling, in which Mr. Dick took no part whatever. This young lady was walking with Mr. Dick's relations, and I think her father and mother came up and tried to get her away. Mr. Dick himself had nothing whatever to do with it Then the next question was almost an indecent question, and Mr. Dick was told that he need not answer it unless he liked. The interrogator was good enough to say that. The question was: "I would like to ask you are you going to marry Miss M.?" What had that to do with a model employer? The answer was perfectly straightforward: "I am engaged to her." Then this gentleman had the indecency to ask the young man: "Is it not a fact that you are now a married man?" There was absolutely no foundation for such a scandalous question. Surely it shows to what a pass Post Office officials have come when in order to bolster up the case they thought it necessary to allow one of their people to ask this young man against whom there had never been the slightest breath of scandal: "You tell us you are going to

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  marry this lady. Is it not a fact that you are already married?" What do they mean by it? What is at the back of their heads? Are they confusing him with somebody else? This was the only opportunity that Mr. Dick had to put his case before the Postmaster-General, and this was the kind of question asked him. If there is any possible scandal that can be brought forward with regard to Mr. Dick let us have it out. The Postmaster-General stated in 1907 that the omission in the Tweedmouth Report had been repaired. I want to know how it has been repaired? The Tweedmouth rule is that a man should have a statement in writing of the charges urged against him. I should like to call the attention of the Committee to the fact that the Postmaster-General knows it should be in writing, and that within the last fortnight he has issued to his officials—I do not doubt it arose out of this matter—a circular distinctly pointing out the way in which the Tweedmouth Report is to be carried out. In this the Postmaster-General emphasises the fact that before an officer is punished for an offence, or an adverse entry is made in his record, the precise nature of the charge should be clearly stated in writing, and every opportunity ought to be afforded him to meet the charge. Further, if any adverse entry is made against any officer, the officer concerned is entitled to be given an extract from the record in which the exact form of the record made against him is shown. That is the Postmaster's rule, issued a fortnight ago. I shall ask him to apply that rule to Mr. Dick. I asked him in the House a week ago, and I put down this notice of Motion to reduce the Postmaster-General's salary; and I put down a further question asking him as to what were the exact charges against Mr. Dick. He has replied to my point in a very friendly way, but without, however, telling me what the exact charges were. I have left out a good deal of the case, but it is clear that the Postmaster-General knew, and has known the case. The reply of the Postmaster-General was that if Mr. Dick was not satisfied he was anxious, not only that justice should be done, but that any feeling should be removed, and he was reviewing the whole case at present. But that is a different question. I am not quite sure that that is what Mr. Dick is entitled to. Mr. Dick to-day is a condemned man—condemned, punished—an entry is made in his register without
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  having had the right which the Tweedmouth Committee gives him, without having the right which the Postmaster-General has given him; and I am not sure that it is sufficient for the Postmaster-General to say that he will review the case again. It will not do until he has put Mr. Dick in a position that he has asked for all along, that he should have the statement in writing to which he is entitled of the charges brought against him of discreditable conduct. I venture to suggest that the Postmaster-General, after the Debate this afternoon, should openly come forward and admit that a system has ruled in the Post Office during the last few years with regard to this unfortunate man, and that this matter ought never to have been raised. I may further say that any ordinary employer of labour would never have taken any notice of any tittle-tattle letter sent by Mr. M. from the outside. Unless there is any real case of discreditable conduct—and we all know what that means—what I think the Postmaster-General ought to say is, "I decline to entertain in this case these charges against Mr. Dick, and I decline to allow my great office to be used as it has been for harrying this young man, because he chose to pay his addresses to Miss M." To a certain extent I owe an apology—
  Mr W. CROOKS: This is an Imperial question!
  Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS: For having brought the case of one man before this House, but personally I am not in the slightest ashamed of having done so. This is the only opportunity which a member of the public service has of getting his wrongs righted. The High Court of Parliament is the only court to which this young man can appeal. Any man in the public service, the humblest person in the Army or Navy or the Civil Service—and I am quite sure the Postmaster-General will agree—has a right, if he is unable to obtain justice, to lay his case before the representatives of the people of this House. On his behalf, and on behalf of a very large number of people who sympathise with him, and feel that he has been hardly treated, I do ask the Postmaster-General to review it, not with the idea that the young man is guilty, but, ab initio, as if he were innocent. If he is wrong I will wash my hands of the whole affair. If he is right I ask the Postmaster-General to reinstate him.
  Mr. BUXTON: Under the circumstances, seeing this is a personal question, I think I should follow the hon. Member at once, and say a few words in regard to it. I have no fault to find with him for bringing it on. Quite obviously, rightly or wrongly, the case has attracted considerable attention, apparently from the point of view that there has been a miscarriage of justice. That being so, it will be well for me to say nothing till there shall be some further inquiry, which shall take place at the earliest possible moment. But I wish to say at once, as regards this case, I take the fullest responsibility on myself. I also want to say that I do not profess to be infallible. I do not in any sense object —where there seems to have been some misunderstanding or some mistake—I have not the slightest objection to the hon. Member, or anybody else, bringing it forward and criticising my action or that of my subordinates. As to the merits of the case, as to whether Mr. Dick has had justice, I do not propose to go at present, having undertaken to review the whole case. I assure hon. Members that I shall do it with an open mind, and, I hope, with absolute impartiality, as if it were an entirely new case. That being so, it would not be proper on my part to follow the various observations of the hon. Member, because that, in a sense, would be prejudging the case from the point of view of himself and Mr. Dick. But I would like to mention two things: The first step in regard to this matter is to fully and frankly admit the mistake which has taken place. Any charges against Mr. Dick ought to have been put in writing. Let me say this in regard to this matter: That, no doubt, was the recommendation of the Tweedmouth Committee, but to the rule there have been certain exceptions under certain circumstances. This was accounted one of them. I understood the hon. Gentleman to say he would not drag the names in here, because it would be rather hard to do so. I agree. I understand that was the chief reason why this matter was not put in writing at the very beginning. The officers in charge believed that Mr. Dick understood the charges brought against him (and I desire to say that they were not entirely of the nature indicated by the hon. Member). The desire to avoid, if possible, bringing the name of this young lady into the matter more than necessary was the chief reason why, in the first instance, the accusation or allegation was not made
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  fully in writing. I fully admit that it should have been done. I have endeavoured to repair that at all events, and in the future every case of any gravity in which anyone is accused of anything in the postal service the charge shall be given in writing to the person against whom it is made. It is only right and just. I say, in this particular mistake was made, and I take the fullest responsibility for that mistake, but the mistake will be repaired. I will repair it in this particular case, and I shall see that the charges in writing of the various allegations are given fully to Mr. Dick, so that he may give his explanation, and in every such case in future. That is the rule I have laid down. I think it is right that it should be done, and, of course, it will prevent such cases as this occurring in the future. That being so, I am sure the Committee would not desire me, under these circumstances, to go further into the matter. I made a further examination, and communicated with the association, who have taken the matter up, immediately after the holidays, and before I knew a discussion was to be raised in the House. After a review on my account of the whole case, I came to the conclusion, before I knew I was going to be asked about it in this House, or that there was going to be any criticism of this matter here, that the question should be reopened, and that being so, I think the Committee will not press me further in regard to the matter to-day. It is clearly a case that should be further investigated, and I, for one, am going to reopen it. But it is also clearly a case which the House itself is incompetent to try. At the same time, I have no complaint against the hon. Member for bringing it up. He is doing it, I presume, on behalf of Mr. Dick, who is entitled to ask his Member to bring the case forward after he had appealed to the Postmaster-General, and after the Postmaster-General had not met his appeal. I have no complaint to make, but I appeal to the House, after the explanation I ventured to give, and after taking the full responsibility upon myself, and after admitting that poor human nature is not always infallible, I ask them to accept my assurance that Mr. Dick shall have the fullest and most impartial inquiry at my own hands into all the circumstances of the case. I think that is necessary, and, what is of far greater importance, I think it is necessary that I should see that any miscarriage of justice, if any such took place, should be removed.
  Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN: Whatever mistakes may have been made in the earlier treatment of the case which the Committee has just been discussing, I think every Member will agree that the course which the Postmaster-General is now taking is the right one. My hon. Friend quite as much as anyone else who took part in the discussion will, I think, recognise that the Postmaster-General, having taken the matter into his own hands, and being about to institute something in the nature of a judicial inquiry of his own, where he will exercise if not actually judicial, at any rate semi-judicial, functions, we must be content to leave it to him, and I would add my own opinion that it is at least as much in the interest of Mr. Dick if he is, as we hope he is, an ill-used and meritorious servant, that the matter should be left with the Postmaster-General instead of being left to this House to decide. Nobody can have listened to the discussion this afternoon, not merely to this particular part of it, without feeling that the House of Commons is attempting to deal with matters for which, in fact, it is altogether unfit. I think the statement of the case—and it was rather a difficult one to bring before the House of Commons—which was made by my hon. Friend, on the whole temperately, and certainly clearly, was treated with some levity which it did not deserve by some Members, and which it is shown not to have deserved having regard to the treatment which the Postmaster-General has himself found necessary to apply to the case. In the earlier part of the afternoon, apart from the large questions dealt with by the Postmaster-General, and by some hon. Members who have spoken, a good deal of our time was occupied with similar small personal grievances, not necessarily confined to single individuals, but arising in particular localities or among particular classes of the postal service. I do not rise to plead these particular grievances to the House, but if I do not do so it is not because they do not arise in the Constituency which I represent or in the district from which I come. Something has been said about the treatment of telegraphists in the six or eight senior provincial post offices—Birmingham is one of them, and Birmingham telegraphists are as dissatisfied with their treatment and with the Hobhouse Report as those of Glasgow or other great provincial cities. In my own Constituency I have more requests made to me to bring the grievances of indi-
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  viduals of a particular class of servants before the Postmaster-General and the House of Commons on this occasion than ever I had before in the course of the 17 years I have had the honour to represent this particular Constituency.
  Why, in the first place, do I not propose to do what my correspondents ask me to do, namely, to take these individual grievances one by one and argue them with the Postmaster-General across the floor? I propose not to do so because I recognise I have not got and cannot get information for the full statement of both sides of the case. The right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster-General has all the information which went before the Hobhouse Committee in interpreting their Report. I am perfectly satisfied that this House, constituted as it is this afternoon or at any other time, is not the proper tribunal or the possible tribunal to try whether the scales of pay be what they ought to be in King's Heath or Bromsgrove Post Offices, or whether they should be so much more or less. We all know we cannot judge a case as we hear it stated by a hon. Member on behalf of their constituent and replied to by the Postmaster-General. We all know we cannot form any reasonable judgment upon a particular case put before us, and when we are arguing cases of this kind in this House in reference to complicated details of classification and scales of pay we are simply paying the tribute which we pay to our sense of duty to our constituents, to the political opinions of our constituents, to the value of their votes, or to our desire to stand well with them. But we ourselves know there is nothing more than formality in the recommendation which we sometimes agree to give, which we know will have no effect upon the advancement of the gentleman on whose behalf it is given, but we know it is easier to give a recommendation than to explain to the person that applies for it that nothing of the kind is of any use. That being so, I want again to call the attention of the Committee to the inefficacy of these discussions, to their hollowness, as affected not merely by what I have said, but by what the Postmaster-General says. One Member heartily recommended to him two gentlemen for the same post and by the same post. Another Member, who was earnestly anxious to know whether his little matter was arranged, but could not remember what place it referred to or who was the person concerned. All this is a hollow sham, and if we can relieve the

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  House of Commons of this hollow sham it would be a great service to the House of Commons and to the Civil Service concerned. We might perhaps put them face to face with something which would give them real redress for real grievance instead of something which only gives parade and show of grievances that may be real or imaginary, but which we, as a House, have no means of dealing with. I have brought this question before the Committee once or twice with regard to the Post Office, and I venture to call attention to it again to-day. Is it impossible for the Government with the general goodwill of the House to make some reform in this matter? I do not think it is possible to do any good unless you carry, I will not say everyone's assent, but I do say unless you have the general goodwill of the House and of all sections of opinion in the House. I have seen it suggested that you should have a kind of permanent Hobhouse Committee sitting in conjunction with the Postmaster-General to guide his hand and to countersign his minutes. I do not know where you would find the Members to serve in such a Committee, and I think you will not find a self-respecting Postmaster-General to take office or hold office on these conditions. It would be an intolerable position to the Postmaster-General, and scarcely a less intolerable position for the Committee, who were to be permanently sitting and to advise him. I talked to some Members of the Hobhouse Committee, Members not drawn from one side or another; I heard them speak here, I heard the hon. Member for Stoke, who represented the Labour party upon that Commission, saying from his place in this House that if he knew what the nature of the work of the Committee was to be he never would have accepted a seat upon it, and he would never sit upon a Committee of the kind again; and I do not believe there is a Member of that Committee, although they took great care and paid great attention to investigating the complicated questions laid before them, I do not think any Member of that Committee would claim that the scheme they produced was an ideal scheme, or anything like it. What are we to do for the future? Are we to have Debates of the kind which we have known year after year ever since I have been in the House of Commons in preparation for which all the political influence of the Civil servants is brought to bear at election times, and during the
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  intervening periods, in order to secure that hon. Members shall not merely represent their case, but deliver the verdict which they wish to see delivered. Party pressure in this way is brought to bear in order to secure a majority in favour of this verdict without any real examination of the case. When that pressure is too great, and when many hon. Members have given pledges that they will support a Parliamentary inquiry, are we to have that tempered by a new Hobhouse Committee sitting for a Session or two Sessions producing a new Report, and then the same laborious circle will have to be trodden once again? That seems to be the fate which lies before us unless we can find some new way of dealing with these matters.
  Perhaps the House will pardon me dealing with a personal recollection which is germane. So impressed was I with this matter when we were in office that I made a proposal across the floor of the House that if we could carry with us the general goodwill of the House we would be glad to appoint a Committee not to go into Post Office grievances, but to inquire whether a tribunal could not be formed which would relieve hon. Members from direct and immediate responsibility for these matters; a tribunal in which public opinion would have confidence, and to which the civil servants would give a moral adhesion. We were defeated in regard to that proposal, but we did not resign at once. I was not in a position to follow up the negotiations, and I cannot criticise the then Opposition for not responding to that proposal, but even now when I am in Opposition I am not less anxious than when I was a responsible Minister to take these matters out of our Parliamentary life and out of party consideration. Of all things that threaten the democracy to have your democratic franchise used to promote particular interests at the expense of others is one of the most demoralising and one of the most dangerous things that threaten public life, and I am willing in or out of office to support any movement which can avert that danger and which will take these questions out of our Parliamentary life.
  What is the practical suggestion I make as to the way these questions should be dealt with? I take a precedent from the action of the Government themselves and the party opposite. Some time ago they had to deal with another great service, or rather a series of services, namely, the railway services of this country. The railways were not controlled by the Govern-

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  ment, and yet the dispute which arose was of such importance to the life of this country that the Government could not treat it with indifference. The Government imposed upon the parties to that dispute—I do not use the word "imposed" offensively, because it was cordially accepted by both sides—at the instigation of the Government both sides accepted a proposal for conciliation boards, arranged with all the elasticity required by those widespread systems and diverse circumstances, and subject to the final decision of an impartial arbitrator if the boards of conciliation were unable to come to a unanimous decision. Why will that precedent not suit the public service? Why should we not have boards of conciliation within the Post Office for the wage-earning class of the Post Office and other great Civil Departments, with an impartial arbitrator, which would meet to discuss these things and advise the Postmaster-General what was right in regard to grievances as to wages and declare which were well-founded and which were illusory and ill-founded?
  If you established a system of that kind for the Civil Service with the goodwill of the House generally, and not as a party measure, it might work with the same admirable results as it has worked in the case of the railways, and it might meet with the same general acceptance, thus securing for civil servants a tribunal in which they would have confidence. That would give to hon. Members of this House and the public at large what they require and need, namely, an assurance that there was a fair tribunal for the investigation of such grievances. This course would enable Members of Parliament to disclaim once and for all the claim that it is part of their duty to their Constituency to bring individual or class claims affecting a particular section of public service before this House, and to press them here without a full knowledge of the circumstances and without making, or attempting to make, a detailed comparison with other parts of the Civil Service in regard to the salaries paid for this particular class of work outside. Such a course would enable hon. Members to reply that a fair tribunal had been provided, and they could tell those who complained that if they had a real grievance they should take it to that tribunal and have it argued there. That would only be following a precedent created by the present Government. I submit this precedent in no party spirit, and I am sure I have not said a
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  word on this matter which will offend hon. Members. I ask the consideration of the Government and the Postmaster-General for this suggestion. If they can improve it, by all means let them do so; but do let us have a real tribunal in order to take these Civil Service grievances away from the purview of this House, which is not fitted to deal with them, and which ought to be taken out of the range of our party system.
  Mr. THOMAS WILES: I should be the last person in the world to minimise the many reforms initiated by the Postmaster-General in the interests of the public and the vast army of workers under his charge. I think the workers in the service are very pleased with the recognition the right hon. Gentleman has given to the associations of the Post Office and his readiness in appointing a Committee which will be known in history as the Hobhouse Committee. But, notwithstanding the labours of that Committee, I think the right hon. Gentleman himself will agree with me that there is a large amount of dissatisfaction, and unrest, and discontent existing on the Post Office staff. I have heard with great pleasure the remarks made by the right hon. Gentleman opposite with reference to the formation of a new tribunal. I am a somewhat inexperienced Member of this House, and I should be very loth to mention what kind of tribunal would be the right one, but it does seem to me, having regard to the dissatisfaction caused by the Hobhouse Report, that what has been said by the right hon. Gentleman opposite is well worthy of the very careful consideration of the Postmaster-General and his colleagues. Everybody knows who has any connection with even a large business that its ramifications are often more than one man can control, but when you have a great service like this, extending to every part of the United Kingdom, when the Postmaster-General has an assistant, which I am glad to think he will have before long, even then it seems to me impossible that one man can supervise and control the wages, the hours, and the promotions which must be dealt with in that great organisation.
  I must confess that if some tribunal, some conciliation board, such as has been suggested and which has been put in force in regard to the railways; if some committee could be set up to hear all the details of the grievances which these thousands of men have, it would relieve every hon.

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  Member of this House who naturally wishes to do the best he can for his constituents. That would relieve hon. Members of many troubles and would put the members of the Civil Service in a much more independent position. May I give the right hon. Gentleman two cases which I think could be dealt with by a tribunal of that kind much better than if those grievances continue to be brought forward once a year upon an occasion of this kind. I understand that in the regulations of the Post Office framed upon the recommendation of the Hobhouse Committee that any member of the establishment staff of the Post Office has a right to free medical attendance. That regulation seems to work in a rather curious way, because if a man in the Post Office service works in a district and is taken ill at home in another district, he cannot apply to the medical officer connected with his own district, although he may apply to another medical officer connected with the Post Office, but if he does that he only has the right to 8s. 6d. worth of medical advice per annum. I feel sure that the Postmaster-General would be the last person to say that is a fair carrying out of the Hobhouse recommendation in regard to free medical service, and I hope when the right hon. Gentleman comes to reply he will say that the man who has been unfortunate enough to be taken ill at home, and has availed himself of the medical officer in his district near at hand, will be able to have a proper medical attendance allowance in the same way as if he had lived nearer to the office in which he works.
  Then there is another grievance, which has been mentioned I think twice during the last Session of Parliament, with reference to the telegraphists employed at the central office, and the telegraphists connected with the district office. At one office in Lombard-street 62s. is the maximum wage, and at the telegraphists' office on the Stock Exchange 65s. per week is the maximum. That is a case which seems so outrageous that there can really be no reason why people who send Stock Exchange telegrams should have a higher maximum than those who send the more important telegrams connected with Lombard-street. That seems to me a matter which would be settled better by a tribunal of the kind which has been suggested instead of being brought up each year in this House on the Estimates.
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  There is another class in regard to which I have frequently appealed to the Postmaster-General, namely, the postal porters. Most of them are ex-naval or military men, and they had their maximum wages revised as far back as 1882. At that time their maximum wages were raised from 27s. to 30s. per week, and no revision has taken place since. I think that is one of the cases where the Hobhouse Committee failed, and that after the lapse of years it is time that some tribunal should see that these men have their wages carefully inquired into. There is another matter which has given the Postmaster-General a great deal of thought and trouble. It is known as the "4 a.m. duty." I think that 4 a.m. is a very early time for any person connected with business to arrive in the City, and if any arrangement can be made whereby these men can be put back to 5 a.m. in the morning we should all be very glad. When the Postmaster-General put this 4 a.m. time into operation he said that it should be experimental. I believe that he finds that a large number of men make late attendances. These late attendances will go against a man for his stripes and promotion. When any new departure like that is instituted it does seem to me that a model employer would regard the attendances at the General Post Office or in Mount Pleasant at 4 a.m. as no ordinary matter. Do you know what it means for a man living at Tottenham or Enfield to have to arrive at the Post Office at 4 a.m.? It means that he has to get up at half-past two o'clock. He gets into the City. He delivers the letters, he returns home about half-past nine; he leaves again at 12.50, and he stays at the Post Office until five o'clock and gets home again at six. There is a Post Office regulation that every man shall have a fair nine hours at home. What these men who live some little distance from the Post Office have to do is a violation of that rule which says that they shall have nine hours' rest at home, and I hope that the Postmaster-General will consider again whether this 4 a.m. duty cannot be altered. A short time ago the right hon. Gentleman received a deputation from the men affected by this early duty, and he said in his usual considerate way that if they would put a scheme before him by which the letters could be sorted and delivered by the time they were required he would be glad to alter the hour back to 5 a.m. They did put a scheme before him, and it was re-

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  jected by the Department. I am given to understand that if a scheme can be put forward by the men which will give the same service of delivery of letters in the City the Postmaster-General will be glad to consider it. But, as I have said, when they did put forward a scheme the officials found that it would not work. The men have now placed another scheme before the Postmaster-General, and they are waiting to hear if something cannot be done to alter their hours of work. I understand that although these men begin to work at 4 a.m. that the service is very little better than it was before. One more important point affects the health and work of these men. Since this 4 a.m. duty was instituted the amount of sickness has been greatly increased. I understand late attendances, which are very serious to a postman who is anxious to obtain his extra stripe, are increasing. I hope the Postmaster-General will do all that is possible to find some method to alter this early morning duty and allow the men to begin at 5 a.m., which seems a reasonable hour. I should like to call the attention of the right hon. Gentleman to another matter, and that is the National Telephone staff. These men are in a terribly anxious state as to what their fate is going to be. Some consideration is due to them, and I am sure that the Postmaster-General will do all that is possible. If he can give the House some promise or idea of what is going to be done when the time arrives for taking over the Telephone Company, so that these men may know what is going to be their fate, he will do a great service. One of the complaints made is that a private contractor, in the case of a large hotel or factory, cannot put a telephone installation. In many countries private contractors are allowed to fit up switches, but I understand that the National Telephone Company make a large profit by themselves fitting up these extensions, and it would create a great deal of work if men were allowed to put up telephone fittings and switch on to the main extension. There is still another point to which I should like to call the attention of the Postmaster-General, and that is the question of Sunday labour in the country. It seems to me a most extraordinary thing that when London, Glasgow, Newcastle, Belfast, and 30 other large towns can do without a Sunday delivery that every village and hamlet in the country must have a delivery on Sunday. I should imagine that money would be saved by not having
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  these Sunday deliveries. Postmen have to travel many miles in the case of a Sunday delivery, and I do not think anybody would be inconvenienced if they were discontinued. I know that if any district applies to the Post Office to discontinue a Sunday delivery it will be discontinued, but districts do not take the trouble to do this. I hope that the Postmaster-General during his next year of office will decide to give the men a Sunday rest.
  There is the question of Christmas-boxes. Last year I put a question to the Postmaster-General on this subject, and he gave me a reply. It does seem strange that at the present time in the twentieth century public servants should have part of their wages paid by gratuities. I have been told that the postmen do not want to give up their Christmas-boxes. Of course they do not want to give up part of their remuneration, but if they were paid a higher wage they would not care to solicit Christmas-boxes. If a telegraph boy under 18 years of age goes round to collect a Christmas-box he is immediately dismissed. It is a wicked thing for a boy under 18 years of age to collect Christmas-boxes, but a virtue for postmen over 18 years of age to collect them! The Postmen's Federation last spring passed unanimously a resolution in favour of doing away with Christmas-boxes provided they had a proper sum given to them in place of gratuities. I do hope that the Postmaster-General will see his way to re-consider this matter, and I also think that the abolition of Sunday delivery will be most popular throughout the country.
  Mr. C. HAY: I do not propose to detain the Committee long, but I wish to refer to the matters which arise in connection with the administration of the Post Office during the past year, more particularly as during the past year the right hon. Gentleman has given effect to some of the recommendations of the Committee of which I was a member. No member of that Committee desired to see any postal servant suffer from any of its recommendations whether as regards the payment he receives or the conditions under which he performs his duty. I may remind the right hon. Gentleman that last year when this matter was raised by Members in all parts of the House he undertook that the new scale should apply, and that he would make careful inquiry in the different localities. Well, if the information which reaches me is correct it will seem that the inquiries which were made were of a perfunctory

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  character, merely a few questions being addressed to postmasters, no other investigations taking place from more independent persons than the postmaster. I believe that in almost every case the officials whom the inquiry dealt with were either surveyors or postmasters, and they recommended improvement in the scale of pay. And therefore it is obvious that the reduction had been imposed from headquarters. The right hon. Gentleman's treatment of this matter of postmen's pay is, in my judgment, entirely contrary to the best wishes and intentions and recommendations contained in the Hobhouse Committee's Report. I should like to refer for one moment to another grievance which, as far as I can gather, has been met in a way far from that desired by the Committee. The Committee laid down certain conditions as to what should be regarded as night duty, and the right hon. Gentleman avers that he has carried out those recommendations. The question at issue is whether men going on duty before midnight should be deemed to be working day duty if they work after 6 a.m. I am perfectly satisfied that no recommendation justifies the thought that such work should be regarded as day work if the men work after 6 a.m., having commenced at midnight. Then I must remind the right hon. Gentleman that there is a great deal of feeling among the East Central District postmen as to the 4 a.m. duty, which was referred to by the hon. Member who last spoke. It is obvious that the rule which entitles a man to have nine hours at home out of the 24 has been broken by the Department in respect to these 4 a.m. duty men. I quite believe the right hon. Gentleman has approached the matter in a sympathetic spirit, and I fully realise how difficult it is in view of the demands of the public service and the convenience both of trade and industry to avoid this 4 a.m. duty; but if the interests of the public service are such, surely rather than a hard and harsh application of this duty, he might make some exception so as to enable these men to enjoy nine hours at home. In all reason it is surely not too much to ask this for the men. Then last year the right hon. Gentleman gave a very definite assurance that he would see to it that the mail-cart drivers should have no cause for grievance in future. Well, I have been at pains during the last 12 months to look into the condi-
  240
  tion of these men, and I do not hesitate to say that a large number of mail-cart drivers working under contract for the Post Office are sweated. I am perfectly certain that any man who looks into the hours of work and pay, and the methods by which the men are made by those who employ them to say they are satisfied, will be convinced that these men are sweated, and that the Postmaster-General has not been correctly informed—not by his-officials but by the contractors who are ill-treating their men, and who ought not to be allowed to do so by a great public Department. Then I must refer to what is an old story, and to which the hon. Member who last spoke also referred, namely, the grotesque anomaly that a man who works in and belongs to the same grade, passes the same examination, and does the same duty should receive 65s. in Thread-needle-street, and only 62s. because he performs his duty a few yards away in Lombard-street. The sooner the Lombard-street men are put on the same basis as the men at the central office at Thread-needle-street the better. When these Estimates were under discussion twelve months ago the right hon. Gentleman said he was going to receive a deputation in respect of sub-engineers' pay. It is not necessary to go at length into their case. The sub-engineers, the right hon. Gentleman alleges, really have no grievance, because the Hobhouse Committee, according to his interpretation of its Report, made reference only to new entrants. Last year I took exception to his interpretation of the Committee's Report, and I am here to-day to repeat the view that I then expressed. The Committee made very definite recommendations, and they have all been set aside by the right hon. Gentleman. What were the recommendations of the Committee? They were surely that these men would be given that which an official appointed by the Post Office recommended was their due, whether it be as regards promotion or conditions of service, or pay, and I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to broaden his interpretation of the Committee's Report in this respect so that these men shall get their due. In the course of the Debate this afternoon, unless I am mistaken, not a word has been said as to the affairs of the sub-postmasters, and I would ask the right hon. Gentleman to give the Committee an indication as to what he has done in this matter. With regard to the sub-postmasters, I do not

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  think they can be described as a body of men who are naturally discontented, but throughout the service, throughout the country, there is profound dissatisfaction among the sub-postmasters.
  Mr. BUXTON: I have not seen it.
  Mr. HAY: Rightly or wrongly the application which the right hon. Gentleman has made of the Committee's recommendations has not been received by them with approval. I notice that the right hon. Gentleman is inclined to dissent from the view I have expressed. All I can say is that the correspondence I have received from the gentlemen representing the Federation of Sub-Postmasters and from individual sub-postmasters is of a kind that if they can be described as giving approval of what has been done, it is the strangest kind of approval I have ever known.
  Mr. BUXTON: From what point of view?
  Mr. HAY: Well, take the case of the postal orders which come in large numbers from banks and other institutions. They are inadequately paid in connection with them and with other details.
  Mr. BUXTON: I have been in communication with this association with regard to the bankers' orders, and I came to an arrangement with the association with which they expressed themselves as fully satisfied.
  Mr. HAY: I am very glad to hear that. All I can say is, that within the last seven or eight weeks I have received a statement from gentlemen representing that body which shows they are far from satisfied. But I am quite ready to accept what the right hon. Gentleman says if I can make the sub-postmasters accept it, but if I cannot, I am sure he will allow me to bring the matter before him privately. Now I pass to a paragraph in the Report about which the right hon. Gentleman said something last year, and as to which we on the Committeee, without exception, held a strong opinion. It was with regard to the chief medical officer and the medical staff, for the administration of which he was responsible. The Committee did not mince their words as to that gentleman, and I shall be very glad if the right hon. Gentleman will inform the House that he now performs the work adequately and skilfully, and that he gives his whole
  242
  time to the Department. Then I have another very categorical question to put to the right hon. Gentleman. I think it was in clause 62 of our recommendations that we laid it down that the Committee was strongly of opinion that the Postmaster-General should be master in his own house, and not have to go cap in hand to the Office of Works to ask that repairs and other structural work should be undertaken by that Office for him, involving delay, expenditure, irritation, and great public inconvenience, as well as personal sufferings and great inconvenience to the staff. The right hon. Gentleman pointed out that a Committee of the two Departments was working satisfactorily, and that he had great hopes of their work, but that does, not suffice. What I wish to ask him is this. Has he during the last 12 months been taking into consideration the removal of all the work now undertaken for his Department by the Board of Works to his own office, and has he been in consultation with the Office of Works and the Treasury or the other Departments who have to be consulted before that step can take place? Last year we heard a great deal about Treasury control, and I should be glad if the right hon. Gentleman would likewise say whether any progress has been made during the last 12 months in the direction of freeing the Post Office from Treasury control. We all know how he and his predecessors in office have been "cribbed, cabined, and confined" by the unreasonable delay, which so-called Treasury control has involved, and inasmuch as the Post Office, next to the Army and Navy, is by far the largest spending Department, surely the time has come when the right hon. Gentleman should be responsible for his own Estimates, and for collecting and spending his own money, and not have to go to officials in some back room in Downing-street or Whitehall before he can undertake to decide questions as to the rates of wages of his employés or undertake expenditure which is for the public benefit or the benefit of his great Department.
  I have only two other points that I should like to say a word upon. The first is as to a matter which has been very warmly debated in the country among the staff, and which was gone into very carefully by the Hobhouse Committee: that is the question of civil rights. We have had occasion to criticise the action of the right hon. Gentleman in respect of the treatment he has given to different members of his staff

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  with respect to the political organisations to which they have desired to belong. I do not wish to refer to that to-day, except to say that no one realises more than I do the extreme difficulty in which the right hon. Gentleman is placed in dealing with this question. I am aware that some more or less vague promise has been given by the Prime Minister to consider the whole matter of the civil rights of Civil servants, out has the Postmaster-General, by consultation with the Cabinet during the past 12 months, gone any further to arrive at a decision to deny altogether to Civil servants the full civil rights, or to make it clear that they will not be deprived of them. The present position is detrimental to the public service, and very harmful to the public officials, especially in the higher grades, as well as a source of difficulty to Ministers. Lastly, let me say that I support with all the earnestness I am capable of the general line laid down by my right hon. Friend the late Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his plea for the creation of a Board of Arbitration in respect of Post Office and other Civil servants. It may be within the recollection of the Committee that this is a subject which I have brought forward on various occasions in this House, and I am glad to think that now, with the evident sympathy of the right hon. Gentleman, the suggestion made by my right hon. Friend has brought us near the point where we may perhaps get to a common agreement among all parties, so that the House of Commons, individually and collectively, will be relieved of an impossible task and the public, Civil servants and the House will feel that a tribunal will be in existence, which will satisfy the legitimate aspirations of the staff, and at the same time claim the confidence of the public at large.
  Mr. GEORGE WARDLE: I desire only to address a very few words to the Committee, but I should like at the outset, if I may, to bring back the Debate to the very powerful speech which was delivered by the late Chancellor of the Exchequer with regard to this matter of the Post Office. It seems to me that the whole question of Civil servants is involved in this matter, and I should like to make an appeal to the right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster-General to see whether he cannot consider, or consider with the Cabinet, the question of appointing a Committee of inquiry. As to the precise form which the
  244
  inquiry should take I do not at present wish to say very much.
  Mr. BUXTON: Does the hon. Gentleman mean a Committee of inquiry as to the best measures to be taken?
  Mr. WARDLE: Yes; I mean a Committee to consider the whole question of Civil servants and their relations to this House and to the public service.
  Mr. BUXTON: The best method of carrying out the suggestion of the right hon. Gentleman?
  Mr. WARDLE: Certainly; the best method of carrying out the suggestion which was thrown out. The right hon. Gentleman had something to say about the question of conciliation boards and he referred to the railway conciliation boards as an example which might be followed in the Civil Service. The railway conciliation boards at the present time are very new—they have only just been formed, they are in an experimental stage, and I do not think the experience which has been gained from them, so far, is quite sufficient to warrant us in saying that they are the best method which can be employed. The last speaker referred to the question of Civil rights, and it seems to me that if conciliation boards and arbitration boards do turn out to be, as I hope they may, a proper method of dealing with disputes as regards wages and hours in the Civil Service, then the question of Civil rights would practically be able to settle itself. There would not be the slightest difficulty in giving full Civil rights, provided the questions of hours and wages can be taken, at all events to some extent, outside the purview of this House. But there is another side of that question, and I should like to make an appeal, not only for conciliation boards or arbitration boards but for some court of appeal, which would have to deal with matters of discipline and things of that kind. For instance, the question with which the House has been troubled to-day is one which it certainly would not have been necessary to bring before this House. Some of the worst questions with which railway servants, Civil Service employés, and the servants of corporations and other bodies of this kind are brought face to face with are not questions of hours and wages, they are questions such as the one we have had brought before the House to-day. It is apparently thought that there was something uncommon about that case and that

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  it could not be paralleled in any other employment in the country. But may I be permitted to say that cases of that kind are not at all infrequent on railways, where outsiders do complain, and the men are punished without knowing anything at all about it. I was a member of the Hobhouse Committee, and I quite agree that it was a most thankless task. I do not want to say, as some have said, that under no circumstances would I serve on such a Committee again. The work was hard, it was dry, and I believe the Committee did to the very best of their ability give a decision which they thought ought to satisfy the Post Office and the servants in question; and may I say, that while it may be true and is true that some ground for complaint does exist with regard to the interpretation of the Committee's Report, even that is a matter which is not at all uncommon, for we have in the railway service at the present moment complaints of arbitration awards of a similar character.
  Therefore this is no new complaint, but let me remind the Committee that after all it is not all grievance which was the result of the Committee's labours, for 4,411 postmen did get an advance in wages, and 20,206 of the postmen class have benefited by that Report, so far as actual wages are concerned. It is true, that owing to what I think is a very unfortunate interpretation of the Report, shall we say, about matters for which I am afraid the members of the Committee must accept some responsibility and the Department also some share, because the Report when it got into its final shape did not carry out what I believe was the intention of the Committee, and that was that not a single postman but should receive an advance except in the six largest towns. The scales prepared were intended to give an advance to all other persons, but although none of the existing postmen are to be reduced, yet in 157 head offices and 745 sub-offices, future entrants to these posts are to receive a reduction. That, I think, is very unfortunate, and it arises, it seems to me, from the form of the Report for which the Committee must take some of the blame, while some of it must be put upon the Department. I should like to ask the Postmaster-General just this question: This reduction has been based, we are told, upon reports as to the cost of living which are received or have been received from the Board of Trade, or have been made up by the Department from other reports, received from the Board of Trade. Some of
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  these men, the new entrants, will not suffer from this reduction for two or three or four years. [An HON. MEMBER: Several years.] Well, they will not suffer for it for several years, in the first place ranging from two to three or four years, and I would like to ask, whether in the interval before they suffer this reduction, there could not be a new inquiry by the Board of Trade, or some other Department, into the cost of living, which would give an opportunity of revision, and so prevent this feeling of dissatisfaction in the minds of these men which now exists? In my own Constituency—and I do not say this because I want to take up the position of criticising on behalf of the men, as I very much agree with the plea, that this House is not the place where we should seek to put forward our own constituents' rights and wrongs, although we are bound to do that now, and if the whole question could be removed from the control of this House by conciliation or arbitration boards that I think would be a much better thing. But in my own Constituency there are certain sub-offices which have come under this arrangement for future reduction in which I am told the cost of living is as high as it is in the town itself, and therefore the men feel that they are not being fairly treated. That is so with regard to the hon. Member for Newcastle's Constituency. There are certain sub-offices round about there—mining villages—where the cost of living is said to be almost, if not quite, as high as in the city itself, and where this proposed reduction is to take place. From all quarters that I can hear about, the men are not satisfied with the inquiries which have been made, and which are not of such a nature as to get at the real facts, particularly with regard to rents, and therefore there is good ground for asking for a further revision with regard to this question of the cost of living. Personally, I think the Committee did perfectly right in saying that the twofold standard of cost of living and the amount of work done should form the basis of the wages, but if that basis is to be carried out impartially we must have revision from time to time, and we must have an impartial body to inquire into what the cost of living really is. I hope we may at last have come within sight of a solution of this great difficulty with regard to the great Civil Service of this country, and the greater question of how to settle their grievances. If we have a concern for democracy itself, we must see that this

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  question is of supreme importance, and that some method must be found by which the very fount of democratic life may remain unimpaired, which I am sorry to say it does not seem to be at present.
  Mr. F. E. SMITH: I wish to raise a subject of a different character from those which have occupied the time of the Committee. It is now some considerable time since the System of old age pensions was introduced in this country, and was commenced in association with Post Offices, using them as distributing centres. The Post Office is a very convenient method of dealing with and distributing the pensions; but I need hardly say a condition precedent to their usefulness was that the Post Offices should hold themselves rigidly aloof from all party political questions. I can conceive of nothing more dangerous than that the Post Office should be used for this purpose, unless that elementary consideration was observed. There have been very considerable reasons for supposing that deviations from that requirement have taken place in a number of districts. Instances have been given to me and some of my friends which are not confined to one particular neighbourhood; but it is extremely difficult to obtain in all cases complete proof that such practices have taken place. But I have one case which has been put before me, which seems to be very clearly verified indeed, and which I hope the right hon. Gentleman will consider worthy of attention. It is a case which is complained of in connection with Burnham Post Office, in Somerset, and I have here a declaration of a pensioner supporting the statement that, as the pensioners went to the Burnham Post Office to obtain their pensions, at the same time as they received them they had handed to them an invitation which was in these terms:—
  "Burnham,
  "January, 1909.
  "Dear Friend,—To celebrate the inauguration of the Old Age Pension Act we heartily invite to tea at the Life Boat, on Friday, January 29th, at 5 p.m., when we hope all who have had the honour to receive a pension will favour us with their presence.
  "Signed on behalf of the Officers of the
  Men's and Women's Liberal Association."
  "P.S.—Kindly let us know on the enclosed card if we may expect you. If unable to walk a conveyance will call for you."
  The letter was, according to my informant, handed over the counter by the clerk at the Burnham Post Office at the
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  time the pension was given, and this is the statement made by the pensioner:—
  "I attended at the Post Office at Burnham on Friday, 22nd January, 1909, when I received my pension. I was handed my pension by the clerk in charge of the Office, and I received at the same time from the clerk an envelope addressed 'Old Age Pensions.' I left the Post Office after receiving my pension and subsequently called at the Office in connection with other business I saw Mr.—and in conversation I told him what I had received, and handed him the envelope which he opened at my request. He read the invitation to me and asked me if I intended to go to the tea. I told him I did not, and he asked me if he might have the paper and the prepaid addressed post card which accompanied the invitation. I told him he might."
  and that is the invitation to which I have directed the attention of the Committee.
  I recollect when a similar matter was raised by the Leader of the Opposition pointing to the danger of any practice of this kind, my right hon. Friend said if the experiment of obtaining old age pensions was to fall into the hands of political organisations they would produce one of the gravest political scandals possible, and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, who spoke after my right hon. Friend, agreed that it would be a great misfortune, and might easily become a disaster if a Bill of this sort was to be worked for the purpose of corruption. I am sure that will be the view of the Government, but I cannot help thinking the hon. Member for Newington has, I am sure only through thoughtlessness, given a little encouragement to a view of the object of the Act which I do not think the Committee as a whole would probably entertain. I have had given me a letter written by the hon. Member for Newington and franked by the Government, in which he dealt with the same matter writing to a pensioner:—
  "It gives me great pleasure to be able to inform you and at the same time to congratulate you upon the fact that you have been granted an Old Age Pension, the payment of which will begin next month As I entered Parliament for the purpose of helping the people I am glad to find so many of my Constituents are now about to benefit by the efforts I had made during many years past on their behalf."
  The sentiments are beyond reproach, and no one in whatever part of the House he sits will quarrel with them, but on reflection the Committee will perhaps doubt the wisdom of a Member of the Government approaching in an apparently official character a pensioner in a letter couched in these terms. I am fully aware that the hon. Member intended to write nothing which was not proper for an official Member of the House to write, but I comment on it because I think that if that kind of attitude is adopted by Members of the Government who speak

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  with a deep sense of responsibility, it is quite certain that other persons not occupying equally responsible positions will abuse the official position, whatever it may be, that they enjoy.
  Mr. G. TOULMIN: Does this arise on the Post Office Vote—a letter written by an hon. Member?
  The CHAIRMAN: I was trying to find out if the hon. and learned Gentleman accuses some Post Office official of having done something wrong in regard to this matter. The conduct of the hon. Member for Newington has nothing whatever to do with the Post Office Estimates.
  Mr. F. E. SMITH: I will not pursue it a moment longer. The argument I was developing was that as this had been made public it was likely to influence the judgment of Post Office employés, but I will not pursue the matter further. With regard to the other case, I am sure, if the facts are as I have stated them, and I will give full opportunity of investigating them as I cannot vouch for them of my own knowledge, I am satisfied that no one would disapprove of them more than the right hon. Gentleman, and no one would be more prompt than he in checking any such practice in future.
  Mr. G. HARWOOD: As the hon. and learned Member has had to go as far as Somersetshire to find a case of abuse, if it be abuse, it does not seem the fact that the Post Office has been very largely used for what we recognise would be an evil if it were true. I rise, firstly, because I understand, and I heard with great pleasure, that the Postmaster-General is thinking of hurrying forward the taking on of the telephone system by the Post Office. I want to press that most strongly upon him for two reasons amongst others. A business is carried on in a kind, of temporary condition when it is going to be taken over by someone else in a certain time. In the first place it is in a condition of suspended animation. We have heard how the ordinary extensions which would go on in this business, if it were meant to continue in the same hands, are not now being made. I have some experience of it. There is a backwardness of enterprise in the telephone system which is a very great drawback to the country and to the business requirements of the country, and the sooner it is ended the better. There is another evil, and that is that the system is really being allowed to go back. The instruments have not been kept up and so on, and that is why the same number of
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  people are not being employed in keeping it up who would be, if it was being kept under the same people. There is a lack of employment amongst the workmen of the telephone system simply and solely because it is starved, and I press upon the right hon Gentleman to bring this transaction to an end as soon as possible. It is a great drawback to the business community, and it is a great reflection upon us that our telephone system instead of, as in other countries, being developed year by year, is at a standstill to say the least of it, and, as a business man, I warn the right hon. Gentleman to take care that his capital value is being kept up, because I am afraid if not he will take over a concern which has been allowed to run down. The second point was the suggestion made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Worcester. There seems to be something taking about it at first sight, and those who have been in the House a good many years would be very glad if all pressure of this kind could be removed from us, and as Members of Parliament we could be saved from this sort of pressure from our constituents and others in the Civil Service. That is very desirable, but the House will be very careful that it does not make a mistake in what is acknowledged to be a matter of unpleasantness. After all, the Civil servants are our servants. We are their masters, and we are responsible for their condition, and I do think it would be a very great pity if this House delegated or abandoned its functions in this respect. It cannot do it, as a matter of fact, for we should still have to be appealed to. We have to find the money, and ultimately to find the control. The House should be careful not to constitute these arbitration committees and commit to them certain portions of its own duties. The House is rather under a shadow at present. I do not think it is thought as much of as it used to be. I do not mean any reflection on those who wield its powers, but I think it is more neglected by the public than formerly, because it is thought we have not the powers we had. If we are going to part with our powers and delegate them to juntas and committees I think we shall make a very great mistake, and we will derogate very much from our position and proper authority. After all, why should the postal servants alone be dealt with in this way? If you are going to begin with the postal servants where are you going to end? Are all the servants of the State to be handed over to certain committees to decide as to wages

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  and the rest of it? I think that would be a very large order indeed, and it would be an exceedingly unwise step for this House to take. I venture to press the House, although there may have been irritation associated with this particular matter, not to take so unwise a step. I think the House should not be inclined to accept too readily the suggestion that Members of Parliament are bringing forward these matters, because they are thinking of their constituents or thinking of some electoral calculations. I do not think that is true. I can speak in my own case. I have had no such electoral influence brought upon me. I have never seen a Post Office official in my life in my own town interfering in an election except as a private individual, and there is no town or place with which I am acquainted, where Post Office, servants have come forward and issued public documents, and taken part in elections simply as Post Office officials. I may have been fortunate in my experience. Therefore we are not going to be frightened from raising points affecting our constituents because it may be thought that we are doing it for electoral purposes. That does not weigh in my mind, and I wish to raise the case of my own Constituents, not because they are my Constituents, but because their case illustrates what I think has been a dangerous principle carried out in regard to the Hobhouse Committee's Report. It so happens that my own Constituency is one of those unfortunate places in which there has been a reduction of wages. There has been no advance. The maximum wage of the ordinary postman has been reduced from 26s. to 25s. per week, and there has been a reduction of 2s. per week in the higher grade. We have a right to ask why. I know of no case where the employés of the State have been reduced in any line whatever. Why should postmen be the only ones to suffer? Here you take one class of public servants, the most creditable class, if I may say so, certainly not the least creditable, you make them the stalking horses, and you make them suffer in the process, and no one else. Why? All the correspondence which I have had with the Postmaster-General shows his great kindness and courtesy in dealing with these matters, but still I am bound to raise the question here, because it illustrates what, I think, is pushing too far an unwise principle, and that is making a god of this
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  Hobhouse Committee. I was not one of them. The Members of the Committee who have spoken to-day have spoken most modestly of their efforts, and not with great gusto as to the enjoyment of the position. I think that any rule of that sort may be pushed too far. There are two things about the Report which should be remembered. The Report was never accepted by the Post Office employés as a whole as a satisfactory and final concordat in the matter. From the beginning they declined to accept it. The officials also declined to accept it as a complete settlement of the matter. I would ask the Members of the Committee who have spoken whether it is not the fact that it was not meant to bring about a reduction of wages? That was no part of the idea of the Committee at all. It is what I consider — I do not say the unfair, but the unfortunate application of the rules which has worked out in this disastrous way for a large number of the employés. I do not know what the exact number is, but whatever the number is, it is a large number. In regard to that I would point out that this making of the Hobhouse Report a sort of Decalogue, or law of the Medes and Persians, that cannot be changed, is carrying things too far. In regard to the cost of living inquiries have been made, but they do not seem to me to give an adequate view of the situation at all. When talking of the cost of living it is not enough to state what is the price of meat or bread in a place, but you must take into account the general style of living in a place. We in Bolton have urged the people to live high. We do not believe in teaching people to live low. Men cannot live in Bolton on absolutely the same amount of money as would suffice in some sleepy town or village. You have to take into account the general rate of wages in a place. It happens that in Bolton wages are high, I am happy to say. In a town where working spinners earn £3 to £4 a week, and where people have high wages generally, if you fix 25s. as the maximum for postmen after years of service—
  Mr. BUXTON: It is more than that. The hon. Member has stated that the wages were reduced from 26s. to 25s. as the maximum on the scale, but I would point out that in addition to that the postmen get a very considerable amount both in cash and in other ways, such as medical attendance, boot money, and so forth, so that you must not think that 25s. is the

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  maximum. For instance, in the case of a man with something like 13 years' service the amount of these additions would come to 10s. 1d. per week.
  Mr. HARWOOD: I am much obliged to the right hon. Gentleman for the explanation. I was pointing out to the right hon. Gentleman that the wages of the lower ranks had been reduced 1s. per week. I do so not because it is the case of Bolton in particular, but because it illustrates a large problem as a whole. I ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider gravely whether there is call for any reduction of those wages, and whether he may not be pressing a little too tightly the recommendations of the Hobhouse Committee.
  Sir F. D. DIXON-HARTLAND: I wish to call the attention of the Postmaster-General to a question of organisation with regard to the county of Middlesex. In that county there are places which were only villages not very long ago, but which have grown to such an enormous extent that now they have very large populations. I know of one district where three villages together have a population of 24,000, and the postmen have to serve that population. Therefore, these places are no longer villages. They are really towns, quite as much as the other towns in England. I cannot conceive why these places should be treated as if they were still villages, and put in the fifth class, which means a difference in wages of 10s. a week. I trust that the Postmaster-General will take this matter up with a view to placing the postmen on an equitable footing. People have moved into these districts, and they should no longer be put in the fifth class. The position of the postmen should be considered in relation to the size of the population they have to serve.
  Mr. STEPHEN COLLINS: I desire to join hon. Members in thanking the Postmaster-General not only for his interesting speech, but also for the sympathetic tone he adopted. I think we are all very much indebted to him for his practical sympathy. I wish to refer to the London district I have the honour to represent. As the result of the Board of Trade inquiry into the cost of living Kennington has been put into the second division, and I fail to understand how that is. In Kennington the cost of living is not less than in other parts of London. A petition was sent to the Postmaster-General eight months ago by some of the Kennington postmen pointing out the lack of justifica-
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  tion for their district being put in the second division, and no reply has yet been forthcoming. I daresay there is some good reason for that, and I hope a reply will soon be given. Since I have been in the House I have heard that other districts have been put into the second division as well as Kennington. In regard to house rent, which we know is one of great expense, if we compare Kennington with Bethnal Green and Chelsea, which are in the first-class, we find that three rooms can be obtained in Bethnal Green at from 7s. 6d. to 9s., and in Chelsea three rooms can be obtained at from 7s. to 9s. per week. In Kennington it is no cheaper for three rooms. There you pay from 7s. 6d. to 9s. a week. As regards house rent, you pay in Kennington for five rooms from 11s. to 13s. 6d. In Bethnal Green for a live-roomed house it is no more. Chelsea, which is under the same favourable conditions, has the advantage of the London County Council dwellings. Another matter that is difficult to reconcile is that postmen delivering on the Lambeth-road have a maximum of 35s., while those doing, the same kind of duty on the Kennington-road have a maximum of 33s. Another instance I might give is that of men doing the same kind and same amount of work in different offices. Five men in one office go to 33s. a week maximum, and others for the same amount of work go to 35s. I hope that the Postmaster-General, as he said he would endeavour to rectify any little grievances, will include these matters to which I have referred. I most heartily agree with the remarks of the hon. Member for South Islington, in connection with the Sunday work in the country. As one who knows a great deal about country districts, and was brought up in the country districts, I believe it would be a great boon to poor country postmen and postmistresses, and I do not think the squire, the clergy, and in fact, anyone scarcely would complain. I believe they would be very glad to relieve the country postman, and give him also the one day's rest which he so heartily deserves.
  Mr. F. B. MILDMAY: We all recognise the readiness of the Postmaster-General to give consideration to matters brought before him, and the great trouble which he takes to look into all complaints. Speaking for myself, I think we owe a deep debt of gratitude to him for the personal attention which he has given to the comparatively small matters which we often bring before him. The right hon. Gentleman

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  below me who was once Postmaster-General, deprecated any allusion to local instances just now. I think we should all welcome the establishment of a body such as we wish to see sitting to deal with these matters. But I have the same doubts that have been expressed by some Members of this House, as to whether that body should be on the lines of the body which deals with railway matters. Though the right hon. Gentleman deprecated allusion to local instances, at the same time, as long as the present system endures, we must bring before the Committee of this House instances which we think are typical instances of what goes on over the country, and I think that it is only natural that I and other Members should ask that the country districts should not be forgotten in the consideration of matters with regard to classification. There must be many Members, like myself, who have the same difficulty in understanding the principle which has governed the recent classification of small offices under the Hobhouse Reports. The Regulations which have been laid down may seem in theory, to those who have laid them down, and to whom the local conditions are not known, to be good ones; but to those who, like ourselves, have some knowledge of local circumstances, and watch the results in practice, there seems to be the most extraordinary inequality.
  I only allude to an instance in my Constituency because, as has been said by other Members, an instance is typical of what takes place in other parts of the country. I allude to the small towns in the country districts on the edge of Dartmoor as typical. I would refer the right hon. Gentleman to the case of the two small towns, Buckfastleigh and Ivybridge. Buckfastleigh has been placed in the class which begins at 15s., rising to 21s. Previously it ranged from 17s. to 22s. Other sub-offices under the new methods, which were previously on the same scale, including the town of Ashburton, which is comparatively close by, have been raised to Class IV., and the scale ranges from 17s. to 23s. The town of Ivybridge has been reduced from a maximum of 22s. to 21s. We who know this district thoroughly cannot understand how these differences are created, for in Ashburton, which has increased, and where the postal employés are paid at a higher rate, house rent is cheaper than in Buckfastleigh, where they are paid on the lower scale,
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  and, of course, the cost of commodities is the same throughout South Devon. If I remember rightly, when this was put that there could be no grievance, as no that there could be no grievance, as no present employés would suffer any decrease of pay. But surely if there is a man in the immediate neighbourhood of these towns who ought to have an increase of pay in justice, how in justice can a similar increase of pay be denied to the men in these other towns working under the same conditions and living in identical conditions where the cost of living is, if anything, slightly higher?
  I daresay that the Committee is aware that holiday-makers are finding out in an increasing degree every year the charms of Devonshire, and I should like to recommend all hon. Members who wish health-giving surroundings after the Session to go there. Of course, we welcome this accession of strangers to Devonshire, because they contribute to the prosperity of the district undoubtedly. But what is the result to these little towns on the edge of the moor? The cost of living is continually going up, and rents are always rising. This has occurred within the last two or three years. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will give consideration to cases such as these. I welcome the fact that he has said that all these cases where there has been a lowering of the maximum will be taken into consideration very shortly, and I hope he will not forget the small towns in the country districts, and for this additional reason: I imagine that the inequalities, which in my opinion are hardly justifiable, may be in some measure due to the fact that there can be no Board of Trade Returns of the cost of living in these small towns. The Post Office authorities have more difficulty in judging what would be the cost of living in these places.
  There is another small point. We all recognise the desirability of old soldiers having an opportunity of getting employment on the Post Office. We all know that that acts rather hardly sometimes among the telegraph messengers who have to be discharged, and it is an unfortunate result that these boys should have to be turned out at the most inconvenient age when there is very great difficulty in obtaining further employment. I am not going to allude to particular cases, but I do know of such a case where such a boy has been turned out and has been unable to get employment. He has been acting as holiday and sick substitute for postmen

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  whenever required. Recently be applied for a situation as assistant town postman—a permanent position—and received this answer: "It has been decided that the vacancy at this office for assistant postman is due to a soldier candidate." That I can understand, but it is hard to understand what follows: "We have also been instructed that ex-telegraph messengers must not be employed in the Post Office in future in any capacity."
  Mr. BUXTON: I do not understand that. I know nothing about it.
  Mr. MILDMAY: I thought that probably It was a mistake.
  Mr. BUXTON: It is exactly the opposite.
  Mr. MILDMAY: I am glad to have elicited that from the right hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. BUXTON: I understand from what he read in this particular case that the vacancy happened to be allocated to an ex-soldier, not as regards the ex-messengers our object is to keep the greatest possible number in the service. So, if I have gathered aright what has been said, there must have been some misunderstanding as to the practice.
  Mr. MILDMAY: I thought there must have been some mistake, and I am glad to have elicited that information. I will not say more except to express the hope that he will regard my former appeal to him, and that he will take into consideration the case of the small towns in the country districts where he will not be able to have the guidance of Board of Trade statistics to help him, and where the cost of living very often is continuously increasing, so that the reduction from the highest to the low standard of those employed in these towns can scarcely be justified.
  Mr. J. P. NANNETTI: I thoroughly agree with the suggestion that has been thrown out by the hon. Member for Worcester, and also with the suggestion as to the advisability of establishing some Committee to deal with questions such as we are considering here to-day. Yet, until that happy period arrives, hon. Members must take the only opportunity placed at our disposal to bring the grievances they have to bring before the Committee. I had the unpleasant duty a short time ago of bringing before the House the case of
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  the Irish postal clerks, and the unfortunate friction that has arisen between them and the Postmaster-General. I do not blame the Postmaster-General because that friction has not been settled. I know he has done everything it was possible for him to do. But since I had the opportunity of speaking to him, when I thought from the conciliatory manner in which he spoke that everything would be smoothed away, and that there would be the most happy relations established between himself and this Department, unfortunately a libel action has been begun, arising out of the proceedings which I had to bring before him on that occasion, and while that unfortunate action is going on I am afraid there will be very little hope of arriving at a friendly settlement.
  Mr. BUXTON: I have no control over that.
  Mr. NANNETTI: I am sure that the Postmaster-General is anxious to see friendly relations established, but since my intervention in this matter we have this unfortunate action, and I am sure if the Postmaster-General only gave a wink to the individual who is the cause of this trouble he would see his way to remove immediately the stumbling block that at present exists and bring about the happy results which we all desire. I have risen with the object of seeing if possible whether after friendly discussion a modus vivendi can be arranged in reference to the grievances of postal servants in Ireland. I hope the right hon. Gentleman may find it possible to do everything he can to establish that modus vivendi, so that the unfortunate lawsuit which has been standing in the way and stopping all chance of a settlement between the Postmaster-General and the Post Office employés may no longer prove an obstacle. I myself have individually taken a good deal of trouble to bring about a settlement, and in the interests of peace to remove that obstacle so that we may get back to the friendly relationship which existed between the right hon. Gentleman and this unfortunate body which represents the whole of the postal clerks of Ireland, and any step that can be taken for bringing an end to these disputes which have arisen should be taken. I know that the right hon. Gentleman himself has a sincere desire to see such a result accomplished.
  Mr BUXTON: Do I understand that some time ago one of the officers of the Post Office brought an action for libel?

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  If that is so, I am afraid that is a local question which is out of my ken. But I considered that these friendly relations were again existing, and that it was for the association to approach me.
  Mr. NANNETTI: The association has a perfect right to offer the olive branch to the right hon. Gentleman.
  Mr. BUXTON: How does the Libel Act affect that?
  Mr. NANNETTI: In this way—that while it goes on it prejudices their case. I can assure the right hon. Gentleman that if this libel action is cleared out of the way he will be able to effect that friendly settlement which I am sure both he and I desire. With reference to the reductions it is really a very serious matter. We cannot understand why there should be any reduction among the class of persons upon whom it is made. They are the very poorest class in the service. Their wages are small, and to take a shilling off the wages of these men would be a very great hardship. Whenever a reduction is to take place it is always in the case of the very poorest classes of employés, and never in the place of those who are highly placed and highly paid. The reductions are always in the case of men who have not a living wage as it is, and who are on the brink of starvation—trying to exist—it is not living—on the miserable wage which is given. I am not going over the whole question of the cost of living in various parts of the country, but I can assure hon. Members that the cost of living is as dear, if not dearer, in Ireland than in England. House rent is dearer in Ireland and provisions are dearer, because they are scarcer in Ireland than here. [An HON. MEMBER: "No."] The hon. Gentleman says "No," but we who live in both countries at different periods of the year are entitled to be credited with wider experience of the matter than those who live only in the one country, and I venture to say that I am right in what I state and that the hon. Member is wrong. There is another question affecting postmen in Ireland. Some time ago a revision of their duties was promised; it was stated that they would be rectified. Nothing has been done for two years.
  Mr. BUXTON: Where?
  Mr. NANNETTI: In Ireland. Of course it is from Dublin I get my information, but I am speaking of Ireland generally.
  Mr. BUXTON: It must be some particular case.
  Mr. NANNETTI: The facts are sent to me from Dublin, but I am speaking of Ireland as a whole. I stated that a revision of the duties of the men had been promised some time ago, and I am given to understand that many of the auxiliaries outside have not been given employment, and at the present time they are overworking the unfortunate men who are employed. Then there is the question of strike adjustment—a matter which has given a great deal of trouble. Nothing, however, has been done, and I do hope that the matter will receive attention. A further question relates to the employment of reserve men, who are taking the place of telegraph messengers. I have not one word to say against the soldier or his right to employment if possible, but in a country like Ireland, where employment is so scarce and where men are going about without any pension or means of subsistence, it is really very hard for them to find being, taken by other men places to which they feel that they themselves are entitled. They are there waiting for employment, and they cannot possibly get it. This is becoming a very serious question in Ireland, for it is seen that the civilians are gradually being weeded out, and that everything in the country is being done by military men. Only the other day linesmen and other men in the south-eastern district found themselves shifted, and military men were brought to take their places. There is the strongest feeling in Ireland with reference to the conduct of this Government in importing military men, not into the Postal Department alone, but into every Department in Ireland. I say it is a scandal that we in Ireland should pay our taxes, and that our people should be thrown out of employment for the purpose of making room for military men, and, mark you, these military men are not out of employment, because they are in employment in England, and they are transferred to Ireland, with the result that the civilian in that country is put on one side. Only the other day in Cork a very big meeting was held in protest against this system. It is my duty to bring it before the House, and it is very serious indeed, in view of the position in which we are placed in Ireland, that such a system as this should be allowed to continue. The hon. Member who last spoke drew attention to the discharge of tele-

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  graph lads. I think it is one of the great scandals in Ireland that you should employ lads up to the age of 16, and then throw them out at a time of life when they are practically unfitted to take up any other employment. From the business point of view the telegraph messenger, when he has reached the age of 16, 17, or 19, as the case may be, is really of service to the State; he is a valuable asset to the Department; he knows the business. But it is at the very moment when he gets to know his business that he is dismissed, and a new staff of lads is brought in. As a manager of men myself, I think my employer would not keep me very long if I took in apprentices and taught them to be useful, and then, having done so, dismissed them and brought in other boys to begin the whole work of training afresh.
  When we get these boys into our service and train them up to a certain age they should know that they have before them stepping-stones to promotion, and that they may go from the position of telegraph boy to that of postman, and then to that of sorter. By the adoption of such a system the Post Office would be carried on in a proper way. I cannot understand the existing policy of training these lads to a certain age and then throwing them out of employment. It is a cruelty to them to induce them to come into the service and then to dismiss them. I blame the fathers and mothers, but unfortunately the fathers and mothers do not know what is coming, and they are anxious for the few shillings a week which the lads are able to earn. As it is the boys are kept there until they are 16, and then they are thrown out on to the world. In Ireland they have no trades, no large sources of employment, no big factories, where these boys might possibly obtain work, but, having given five or six years of the best period of their life, they are thrown out of work and they may enlist or emigrate; and all I can say is that the result of this policy or of this system which is being carried out will cause the boys to enlist. Another point which has been emphasised very much tonight has reference to the operators in the Telephone Department. I wish to impress upon the right hon. Gentleman that anything he is doing here in England with reference to the Telephone Department and the operators there employed might be extended to Ireland. In that country I am told that skilled men who understand the business are gradually being weeded out. "When you come to take over the Department in 1911 you will have to get in
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  efficient operators to conduct the work of the Department. From the point of view of the workmen that is a state of things which should not be tolerated, but it is of still greater importance so far as the Department itself is concerned, because the fact of these skilled men being weeded out leads to the works getting neglected, and when they are taken over you will find the system starved, and you will have to pay much more money than you would otherwise if you now see to it that this company carried out its obligations to the Postmaster-General, and sees that the telephone service is kept in a state of the highest efficiency.
  Mr. NEWDEGATE: I have a certain amount of diffidence in bringing this matter before the Committee after the statement of the right hon. Member for East Worcestershire, but the only way of dealing with grievances in any part of the country is for the Member, as well as he can, to state them to the Postmaster-General. Two days ago I had a communication from the Post Office employés at Erdington, which is a place in my Constituency with a population of 43,000, and I was asked to bring their grievance before this House. I then and there wrote and gave the information to the Postmaster-General, and I ventured to inform the House what the facts were, and I felt certain, from the sympathetic way in which the Postmaster-General spoke, that he would give attention to this grievance. An extraordinary state of things exists in Erdington, where there is a sub-post office, where the postmen are paid at the rate of 25s. per week. In the neighbouring places—
  And, it being a quarter-past eight of the clock, and there being Private Business set down by direction of the Chairman of Ways and Means, under Standing Order No. 8, further Proceeding was postponed without Question put.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.
[Mr. SPEAKER in the chair.]
PRIVATE BUSINESS.

  KILKENNY, CASTLECOMER, AND ATHY RAILWAY BILL.
  Order for second reading read.
  Motion made and Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a second time."
  Mr. DENIS KILBRIDE: I am glad that my hon. Friend the Member for Carlow does not intend to persist in his opposition to this Bill. I only rise for the purpose of saying that those who promote this Bill understood that the Member for Carlow was simply doing his duty by his Constituents, that it was his Constituents who were forcing him to oppose this Bill as far as he has opposed it; and that those who promote the Bill nor those who live in the district through which this railway will be constructed quite understand the position into which my hon. Friend was forced, I believe very much against his own desire and his own personal will, and that we thoroughly understand the position he has taken up. I take this public opportunity of assuring my hon. Friend the Member for Carlow that nobody either in Kildare or Queen's County, nobody who is concerned in any way with the success of this railway, has anything to say which would be injurious to him. We thoroughly recognise his position, and we thank him for having withdrawn any further opposition.
  Read a second time, and committed.

SUPPLY.
  CIVIL SERVICES AND REVENUE DEPARTMENTS ESTIMATES, 1909–10.

    POST OFFICE VOTE.
    Postponed Proceeding on Question proposed on consideration of Question, "That a sum, not exceeding £12,277,930, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1910, for the salaries and expenses of the Post Office, including telegraphs and telephones," which Question was, "That Item A (Chief Offices) be reduced by £500"—[Sir Edward Sassoon]—resumed.
    Mr. NEWDEGATE: I will resume at the point at which I left off [at a quarter past eight of the clock]. What I wish to point out is that at Erdington, which is a large suburb of Birmingham, in the constituency I represent, with a population of something like 43,000, the postmen are only paid at the rate of 25s. per week, whereas in the neighbouring places of Selby Oak, Moseley, and Harborne, which are equally sub-
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    post offices, they are paid at the rate of 27s. per week. There is practically no difference in the cost of living in those places with the cost of living in Erdington. It cannot be said the difference in wages is due to population, because one of the places I have mentioned has a population of only a little over ten thousand. In Birmingham, which is only two or three miles distant, the postmen are paid 30s. per week. What is more extraordinary still is that in one of the wards of Erdington the postmen are paid 30s. per week. I have turned up the pages of the Hobhouse Committee's Report, and have tried to find out if there is any reason for this differential treatment, but I cannot discover that there is. There is one other matter I should like to mention, and touched on by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire. That is the question of the postal telegraph clerks in Birmingham. It is considered a hardship by those clerks in Birmingham that they should receive a maximum pay fixed in 1890 at 56s. per week, whereas in London the same class of clerks receive 62s. per week. There is a good deal of dissatisfaction with that, as the rate of living has increased in Birmingham in later years. It is a question of mystery to know why from time to time clerks in Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow, and Edinburgh should not be paid as well as telegraph clerks in London. The figures I have given as to the postmen I have not had time to verify for myself. They were sent to me by the Secretary of the Postmen's Federation of the district, and I think the Committee will agree if there are those divergences of payment in so small an area those grievances ought to be remedied as soon as possible. I feel certain, from the very sympathetic manner in which the Postmaster-General spoke on the subject of the Post Office service generally, and from the attention which the hon. and gallant Member has taken to my figures, I feel certain that this will have the attention of the Government, and that a grievance of this kind may be redressed.
    Mr. C. E. PRICE: I wish to ask what is the present position of the underground telegraph system in Scotland. This to us is a very important matter. Last year, when I brought the matter forward, the Postmaster-General said that Edinburgh had been a stumbling block, owing to the difficulty of getting wayleaves. I understand that this difficulty has now been

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    overcome, and I shall be glad to know what is the intention of the Post Office with regard to the extension of the system. There are times in Scotland when, in the course of the very severe weather which we suffer, there is practically a block in business, and it is exceedingly difficult to get telegrams through. I myself have been snowed up in a town for three days, with no communication by railway, telegraph, or anything else; and in some cases railways have been blocked for a fortnight. It is, therefore, very essential that this system should be extended as speedily as possible, and I shall be glad if I can get some information on the point before the Debate closes. Reference has been made to the grievances of the men in the National Telephone Company's service. I have had communications from some of these men in Edinburgh, and, after going into the question very thoroughly with them, I am satisfied that the present arrangement is not what I should call common sense. Practical working arrangements perhaps cannot be entered into for a year or two, but it is essential that the Post Office should anticipate the time so that those who are employed may have some security, and feel that their interests are not being overlooked. It is necessary that they should be kept on now, and that arrangements should be made for continuing the service in a satisfactory manner. Another point I should like to bring to the notice of the right hon. Gentleman is the employment of sub-postmasters in country districts. The time that these officials are kept at their posts is in some cases hardly credible. In many cases sub-postmasters have to take charge of the telegraph system, and they are obliged to be on duty on Sunday mornings. One way in which I think relief might be given is on Bank Holidays. In country districts many of the people go into the towns on Bank Holidays, so that these men are really not required, and if some arrangement could be made whereby they could have a holiday the same as other people it would give very great satisfaction indeed. Reference has also been made to a subject arising out of a circular calling attention to the fact that in the London district there has been an increase of 3s. in the maximum rate of wage of telegraphists, while in the principal towns of the United Kingdom no increase has been made. It will probably surprise many Members to know that in seven out of the
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    10 principal towns in Scotland the price of food and the cost of living are actually higher than in London, and yet the rate of wages is considerably lower. I think there should be some revision of the differences in the rates of wages in regard to these large towns. Edinburgh is classified with Leith, but anybody acquainted with Edinburgh knows perfectly well that the cost of living there is vastly in excess of the cost in Leith. On the basis of comparison which is taken, London comes out at 100, whilst Edinburgh and Leith together come out at 99; but if Edinburgh were taken apart from Leith it would come out higher than London, and yet the rates of wages of Civil servants, particularly in the Post Office, are very much lower in Edinburgh than in London. That, I think, is a matter which should be gone into. Reference has been made to the telegraph boys. There is nothing worse than that you should start boys in a position in which they are unable to continue as they grow up, and that you should keep lads up to 16 or 17 years of age in the telegraph service and then send them adrift, when during those years they might have been learning a proper trade. You are thereby feeding the ranks of the men who become unemployed in middle life. I certainly think the House should strongly condemn that system; it is a disgraceful system, and I trust the right hon. Gentleman will give serious consideration to it. I should like to commend the right hon. Gentleman for the care and attention he has devoted to many matters which I have brought to his attention. I called his attention in particular to a district which is excluded from the night delivery of telegrams. He went into the matter carefully, and I wish most sincerely to thank him for having extended the system to that district.
    Mr. J. SEDDON: I echo the statement made by the Postmaster-General when he said he was sorry that the Estimates had been brought forward so early, because I understood him to say that he had been making inquiries in pursuance of a promise made last year. I had a vivid recollection of that promise, but in order not to be unfair to him I have looked up the speech delivered last year, when he said that he was open to argument in regard to any particular town—that was with regard to the classification and the cost of living. On that occasion I gave him the names of two towns, St. Helens and Newton. Since then nothing has been done. I take it that the inquiry is still proceeding, and that these two towns will come under his

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    review. I wish to direct attention to the cheese-paring policy of the Hobhouse Committee. The sense of injustice in the minds of those who are suffering reduction is keen and widespread. Last year I called the attention of the right hon. Gentleman to the fact that in several cases reductions had taken place without any inquiry at all. This year the position is even worse. Out of 900 cases, in something like 800 there has been a reduction without there being any inquiry whatever, and the result is that the men, rightly I think, feel a sense of injustice. Whatever may have been the finding of the Hobhouse Committee, proposals for reductions ought to rest upon inquiry, and not having had the advantage of inquiry the men feel a grievance against the Postmaster-General. I sincerely trust that for the sake of the public service and for the sake of contentment in the postal Department, the right hon. Gentleman will see his way speedily to give attention to the particular districts where there have been reductions without inquiry. In the course of his observations the right hon. Gentleman said that the Treasury had treated him generously, but that at this time, particularly with the prospect of the Budget, with a declining revenue and greater calls on the Chancellor of the Exchequer, he did not feel called upon to make any further demand. I wish the same sentiment had been in the minds of the occupants of the Front Bench before they decided to give 150 per cent. increase to men who are getting £40 a week. The men who are receiving from a guinea to 25s. per week are far more worthy of consideration, especially considering the important duties they have to discharge. These men often carry valuables. Frequently the low return in wages from labour is a temptation for a man to become dishonest. I think we can compliment ourselves that the great army of postmen, a large army, are so scrupulously honest, and that there are so few cases of peculation or robbery. But I think, so far as possible, temptation ought to be put beyond their reach. We are now compelling them to live in districts on a low wage, and from my observation and from my own inquiry—I have taken the trouble to make purchases in the districts of St. Helens, Earlstown, and the neighbourhood of Liverpool, where they are on a higher scale—I find, generally speaking, that, including everything, rent, clothing, food, etc., the men of
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    Liverpool can live, if not cheaper, quite as cheaply as those in these particular cases. If that be so, I think the case for inquiry has been made out, so that inquiry should precede reduction. Again, I have a strong complaint against the haphazard way in which the Board of Trade carried out their investigations. I know something of the retail trade of the country. I have made inquiries as to how it was done, and I was amused, if not disgusted, to find that some superior officer presented himself at some private trader, or some shop where commodities were sold. He made sundry inquiries, and upon these he based the average of the cost of living. He might by accident be in a shop that is known as a cutting shop, who did not sell the best grade of article. Because of this, these men are to suffer a reduction. Because a man, who has been sent out to make inquiries, simply hit upon a haphazard method—by good luck might get the right information in some districts—by want—I will not say ability—but want of training, and probably time, he did not make an extended inquiry—I say, because he happened to hit upon a trader who was known as a cutter in the trade, selling second-rate articles, the postmen must suffer in this direction. I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to allay this unrest. For all that we demand, and what we have a right to expect, is a certain contentment among a body of public servants, and it is a rankling sense of injustice that it is creating all the protests that are reaching hon. and right hon. Gentlemen on each side of the House. From these 800 districts, I say reasonable grievances exist among the postmen where there has been no inquiry, and until inquiry takes place there ought to be no reduction in their wages.
    Sir FREDERICK CAWLEY: The Postmaster-General seems to be under no delusion that there is very great dissatisfaction and heartburning in a great many districts all over the country on account of the differentiation which has been made in the postmen's wages, without any apparent reason for that differentiation being made. I happen to represent a district that lies between Manchester and other large towns, and the postmen in my Constituency—which is composed of a number of large urban districts—are suffering a reduction in their wages. They are being given less wages than the postmen in the large towns close by. In a place called Failsworth, which lies between Oldham

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    and Manchester, wages have been reduced from 24s. to 23s. I believe, as a matter of fact, that the expenses of postmen are greater in that district than they would be in either Manchester or Oldham, because the people of Failsworth, if they want to shop at any of the large shops, have to go to either Manchester or Oldham. Therefore they consider, and I consider, that they are rather arbitrarily treated in not having as large wages as their neighbours. The Postmaster-General is probably sure, after the testimony he has had from everybody on both sides of the House—I think he ought to assure us if he can in this matter.
    Another point I wish to mention is in regard to telephone construction and the staff. The Postmaster-General is in a very difficult position. A state of affairs has arisen which it is very difficult to cope with. On the one hand, the Telephone Company decline to go on with further construction unless they get certain terms, and the Government do not feel quite inclined to give them those terms. If the Postmaster - General were to accede to the exorbitant terms asked for by the National Telephone Company I daresay there are people in this House and outside who would blame him as a very poor negotiator. On the other hand, if he declines to deal with the National Telephone Company, in 1911 he will be blamed for being the cause of several thousand hands being thrown out of work. It is a very difficult position for him to be in. We all know sufficient of the Postmaster-General to know that he will really do his best to obviate any great dislocation of labour, whilst making the best bargain he can for the country. I would myself appeal to the Telephone Company, as well as to the Postmaster-General, to try and be reasonable in this matter. I hope the Telephone Company, who have an enormous reserve—their shares stand at a very high price—will be reasonable in their demands, so that the Postmaster-General may come to terms with them, and that the Telephone Company will be taken over sooner, or there will be some such arrangement made by which any dislocation of labour may be obviated. But I wish particularly to make that appeal from these Benches to the Telephone Company, as well as to the Postmaster-General. Another point: I mentioned it to the Postmaster-General privately. That is this: That people in Spain are complaining that the parcels post rate to
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    Spain is very considerably in excess of the parcels post rate from Germany to Spain, with the result that Germany is increasing her trade by goods which are sent by parcels post very much to the detriment of the trade of the people of this country. I believe that difference obtains between England and other countries, as well as between Germany and Spain. If the Postmaster-General can say that he will look into the matter, and see if he can give such terms to people sending parcels by post to Spain as will put them on an equality with people sending parcels from Germany to Spain, I think it will be a very good thing for the trade of this country.
    Mr. ASHLEY: In the first place, may I join many other hon. Members in thanking the Postmaster-General for his unvarying courtesy and close attention to any matters I have brought before him? Several times in this Debate a remark has been made as to the unfortunate case of the telegraph boys, who have to give up their work as telegraph boys when they reach the age of 16; are taken on as auxiliary postmen till 19; and then are thrown upon the world with no provision, with no trade, not knowing how to gain a livelihood, and therefore joining the ranks of the unemployed. It is very much easier to draw attention to those kind of things—this most unsatisfactory state of things—than to suggest a remedy. It seems to me that this question of the employment of boys in after-life is very intimately bound up with the employment of old soldiers in the Post Office after they have done their work in the Army. We shall never have a satisfactory solution of this problem till we have in the infantry, as we have in the cavalry and artillery, short service concurrent with long service. If we got short service in the infantry we should have more old soldiers demanding employment in the Post Office, and nearly all of them would be able to get employment in the Post Office. And then we should be able to see that the boy who joins as a telegraph messenger, and then becomes an auxiliary postman, when he joins the Army for seven years at the age of 26 able to go back to the Government Department in which he first started to work in the Post Office service with his Army pension and his Post Office pay both turned to good account. Of course it is out of the power of the Postmaster-General himself to do this, but he might approach the Secretary of State

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    for War with a view to bringing about some such arrangement. There is only one other point I wish to bring forward, and that is with regard to the wages of certain postmen in my district. I think the postmen of the town of Fleetwood are not receiving as good terms as they should under the Hobhouse Report. The maximum is 23s., the average rate paid by these postmen for house rent is 7s. per week, the poor rates are 7s. 3d. in the £, and if we take all these facts into consideration, and also that the rate of living in Fleetwood is abnormally high, and likely to remain so on account of the increase of the fishing population, I think the case of Fleetwood postmen should receive the attention which the right hon. Gentleman promised in his opening speech. If we look at the district we have three or four towns—Blackpool, Fleetwood, Lytham, and St. Anne's; in St. Anne's and Blackpool the minimum is 25s., but in the other two, Fleetwood and Lytham, where the scale is on exactly the same footing, they have only 23s., and the Lytham people have been reduced from 24s. to 23s. I hope, having brought these facts before the right hon. Gentleman, he will take the case of Lytham and Fleetwood postmen into consideration. Finally, I have been asked by the postmen who live in the Constituency next to mine, namely, Chorley, to bring their case before the right hon. Gentleman. Something the same has to be said here as in the case of Lytham. It is well known that there is an extremely efficient staff in the town and district of Chorley, but that their maximum also has been reduced from 24s. to 23s. No inquiry was made, so far as I can ascertain, into the facts of the case as regards the Chorley postmen. May I take it that the right hon. Gentleman will inquire into the case of these postmen? I understood him, in his speech this afternoon, to say that all cases where reductions were made would be again inquired into. In the case of the Chorley postmen there has been no inquiry; they have been arbitrarily reduced without any inquiry, and, therefore, I hope that these facts which I and the Noble Lord who represents the Constituency have brought before the Postmaster-General, will lead to a fresh inquiry in regard to these matters.
    Mr. TOULMIN: As I hold office with one of the largest customers of the right hon. Gentleman, and I am also a Member of the
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    Press Committee, which keeps its eye upon the Post Office, perhaps he will permit me to express our obligation to him as having found him a very progressive Postmaster-General. We have had to approach him on several matters with regard to the careless manner in which Press messages were sent to the newspapers, and also with regard to the arrangements we desire, if possible, for expediting Press messages, and on every subject on which we approached him we found him most sympathetic. Indeed, the sympathy he has shown to us will encourage us to approach him still more often, and to endeavour to induce him to give still further favours to the Press, to whom a few minutes quicker delivery of Press telegrams is becoming more and more important, in view of the earlier hours at which they have to go to press. I am rather sorry that the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire did not remain in the House to hear the remarks made upon the speech which he delivered. He made the one intervention in the Debate which really raised a great question of principle, and which put this Debate upon national rather than upon mere parochial lines. I am sure the House heard with great pleasure his very careful statement of the problem which faces us all. It is our desire to have some tribunal or other which would relieve Members from having to discuss questions of local detail and from having to trouble the Postmaster-General with them. I am quite sure the plan he foreshadowed is well worthy of examination, and I feel all the more sympathetic towards it, inasmuch as I myself have to say a word or two on local matters, seeing there is no tribunal before which these complaints may be brought. One has to do this, as the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire has stated, without having access to all the comparative information which the Hobhouse Committee had and the Postmaster-General has. I should like to give another reason for some such plan as that which he foreshadowed being adopted, and that is, that I believe all these local questions of detail, of wages, and hours of labour set up a feeling of official irritation in the Government Departments which prevents the establishment of other classes of workers in other Departments for fear of increasing the number in the employ of public departments. I am not sure the real reason why this House is not allowed to print its own Debates does not lie in

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    that very fact. It arises really from a fear of getting more workmen, and that, as a result, the amount of these questions would be increased in the House.
    Returning to the work of the Department I have to bring before the right hon. Gentleman a question of the status of the postmen of Bury. The right hon. Gentleman has spoken of the influence of his Department upon the labour market as being good or bad. I am quite sure that many towns in which a reduction has taken place have found the influence of the Department upon the labour market were rather bad. In Bury the postman's minimum has been reduced from 18s. to 17s. and the maximum from 26s. to 25s. This is not a question of 62s. or 63s. on which one Member appealed to the right hon. Gentleman; it is a question of 17s. or 18s., and I feel more concerned with the small minimum initial wage than with the larger wage which can be eventually obtained. I do not think there was any inquiry held in Bury with regard to the cost of living. Certainly this initial wage gives no opportunity for what the Member for Bolton spoke of as living high. He said they encouraged living high at Bolton and that the particular minimum there was rather difficult; so it is at Bury. In fact, I think the Lancashire towns appear specially to have suffered by this strict adherence to the scale of the Hobhouse Report when it suggested rather a lowering than an increasing of the rates. I do not think sufficient account is taken of the competition for houses in these Lancashire urban areas. I might point out that these Lancashire towns and seaside towns, which are filled by the holiday flow from other towns, are not like towns situated in the centre of an agricultural area. A place like Bury, which is surrounded by larger towns, is actually prejudiced by that condition in the fact that there are big markets in the large towns, and the produce naturally goes to the larger markets; and this has an unfavourable influence upon the smaller markets. I am actually assured that the cost of living is claimed to be quite as great at Bury as at Bolton, or even at Manchester, although those places are from three to ten times the size of Bury. Owing to the cost of living, the rent, and the class of house which a person in the position of the postman ought to occupy, it was expected in Bury that there would be a rise from 18s., and not a drop to 17s. I do not wish to be unfair in quoting the figure of 17s. or 18s. as the
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    minimum, and I recognise the point of the Postmaster-General when he stated that the postman with 13 years' service got other emoluments, which came to about 10s. 2d.
    Mr. BUXTON: I took a postman of 13 years' service as an average period, and that includes a certain number of stripes; but they have advantages now at five years, and they will in future have them at four years. He gets sick leave and medical attendance upon the actual wage scale which represents about 10s. 2d. In addition, as he gets stripes, his wages go up to the scale rate.
    Mr. TOULMIN: I was going to ask a question as to the details. I thought the House would be interested to know what the conditions meant after five years, 10 years, and up to 20 or 30 years' service. I took the sum of 10s. 2d. mentioned by the right hon. Gentleman really as an average. I quite recognise his other point. It is not always made clear by those who are complaining of his action that no postman has been reduced. Nevertheless there are postmen who have been in the service some years who find their fellow workmen working by their side whose status is reduced by these conditions. I cannot help feeling that there will be a continued demand that the right hon. Gentleman should review these cases where the minimum and the maximum have been reduced. I think it is a pity that this step was taken. I do not say that there might not have been a claim for it in some few cases, but I believe the sum saved is comparatively small, and yet it is producing in a very large number of districts a very great feeling of injustice. I believe that the amount saved by the Department does not come to more than £15,000 when all these reductions have taken place, and to save this sum all this irritation is being produced. The influence of these reductions in the smaller towns is not only disappointing to the postmen, but it has an injurious effect upon the status of labour generally in those towns, and I hope the right hon. Gentleman will decide to review those cases where the figure has been reduced.
    Mr. J. S.HARMOOD BANNER: I heard with considerable satisfaction that it is intended as soon as possible to acquire the business of the National Telephone Company, because all towns and cities in the Kingdom will be very glad to come under the Post Office. That is a very

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    good thing in its way, but there are one or two matters in connection with that acquisition which make it desirable to expedite it as much as possible. In the first place, there is the question of the position of the employés. We all sympathise with them in their change of masters, and we hope they will find themselves in a better position than they were before. In addition to that there is the question of the purchase of the instruments and the plant. Speaking from my own experience, I know that the Postmaster-General and his officials adhere very strictly to the rule of acquiring as far as possible English plant and English instruments for the purpose of the telephone business of the Post Office. In the case of the National Telephone Company there is not the same adherence to this rule, and I know that a very great number of instruments have been purchased by this company from foreign firms very freely. When the acquisition of this company by the Post Office takes place it will be found that the State is acquiring a large number of foreign instruments which will have to be worked along with British instruments. For this reason I venture to say that the sooner we put an end to the purchase of foreign material, especially in a big British industry like the telephones, the better it will be for the users of these instruments when they come into general use. This is a very important matter, because during the next two years, unless some arrangement is made, purchases may be made to a greater extent from foreign makers instead of from British makers.
    There is another matter which the people in Liverpool are very greatly interested in, and which has caused a very strong feeling there. I am not going to say much about it, because I know an hon. Member opposite desires to raise the question—I allude to the calling at Queenstown for mails. The Liverpool Chamber of Commerce and the merchants of the districts all round feel this to be a very great grievance. They now possess the speediest flyers in the world for carrying the mails to America, and the calling at Queenstown takes away the advantages which would otherwise arise, from the speedy locomotion and the quick delivery and receipt of letters. I have heard this called an Irish job to satisfy the Irish people, and on this account the interests of Lancashire in the large towns and the general mail delivery to America are being sacrificed for the
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    purpose of keeping open Queenstown and for the smaller interests that arise from it. If that is the case it is very much better to pay the Irishmen so much money—
    Sir F. BANBURY: We have paid them enough already.
    Mr. HARMOOD-BANNER: I should not mind giving them a little further boon if it would obtain the removal of what is a distinct disadvantage to the general trade of this country. It must be obvious that we want the mails forwarded as speedily as possible, but how much time is lost in carrying them first by boat and then by rail to Queenstown. That delay must be got rid of as speedily as possible. A system should be adopted by which full use should be made of the speedy steamers which now carry the mails. I cannot help feeling that the expression of opinion which has come from several hon. Members is fully justified. An hon. Member stated that he congratulated the Member for East Worcestershire in having said that he dealt with some of these matters under discussion in a national way. I do not consider it a national way to give postal telegraph clerks in London higher pay than telegraph postal clerks in Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, and elsewhere.
    Mr. TOULMIN: The hon. Member has not caught correctly what I said. What I said was that the hon. Member for East Worcestershire had raised this Debate from a parochial to a national level.
    Mr. HARMOOD-BANNER: With that I thoroughly agree, and I am sure other Members of the House will be glad to have a Committee appointed to go into the questions, but at the same time there is the fact that the Hobhouse Committee has dealt with London in a different way from that in which it has dealt with other large towns. I am quite aware that this does not affect Scotland so much as English towns. They eat porridge in Scotland, and can live there very cheaply, but they do not eat porridge in Liverpool.
    An HON. MEMBER An HON. MEMBER: They do not eat porridge in Scotland.
    Mr. HARMOOD-BANNER: I have been there, and I always found that they did. The living in Birmingham and Liverpool is quite as dear as in London, the only difference being the cost of rent and locomotion. There is the fact that 3s. are added to the payment of the men in certain parts of

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    London, and I understand that the right hon. Gentleman is likely to extend that 3s. to other districts round London. There is a preference in favour of London. It may be that only 2s. ought to go to Birmingham and Liverpool, but there is no question that it is inconsistent to extend an increase to one class of men without giving it to the others. There is nothing in which men feel a sense of oppression und injustice more than the granting of preference to one of their class over the others. There has been no alteration made in the maximum for 19 years, although undoubtedly the cost of living has increased in Liverpool and other towns. There are many officials of the Post Office who are satisfied with the Hobhouse recommendations, but it is clearly impossible to satisfy all the men when you give a class in London an advantage in wages over similar classes in other large towns, while the men in other large towns get no increase in the maximum of pay, notwithstanding their length of time. I feel that I should not have done my duty as one of the Members for Liverpool if I had not brought forward this subject, and I maintain that it is just as important for the officials in the large towns to have an increase on the maximum as it is in London, and I appeal to the right hon. Gentleman to do something in the matter.
    Mr. A. C. MORTON: With regard to the proposition made by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire I think this is hardly the time to consider a great alteration of that sort by which it is proposed to deprive the House of its position as the grand inquest of the nation. No doubt there might be boards of conciliation to assist the Postmaster-General to settle some of these questions, but, as far as I am personally concerned, I should protest against an effort to take from this House its position as grand inquest of the nation in all these affairs. Does anyone suppose that the Dick case would have been settled as it was if we had not had the opportunity of bringing it forward in this House? The Post Office have had the matter before them for two or three years.
    Mr. BUXTON: I said that the action I took was quite irrespective of any action in this House.
    Mr. MORTON: I am not making any charge against the right hon. Gentleman.
    Mr. BUXTON: The imputation is that if it had not been for the House of Commons
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    I should not have endeavoured to do justice to Mr. Dick, and I must ask the hon. Member to accept my word in the matter.
    Mr. MORTON: I am, of course, quite willing to do that, but the right hon Gentleman does not understand my point. Unless there is some way of bringing cases like that before this House I do not suppose that he will have the opportunity of hearing anything about them. That is a question of great importance to individuals. Unless such cases are brought forward by Members of Parliament they can never come to the knowledge of the right hon. Gentleman. I am not condemning him. The point is that if we did not bring them forward he would not otherwise hear of them at all. He cannot be expected to know everything about the great army of men which he has to look after. He must to a large extent trust to officials under him. I do not wish to blame him in the matter. Having gone so far, I wish to say that if he is going to inquire into the case, I hope that when he finds the official who has broken the Regulations, he will, as an example to other officials, see that he is properly dealt with, so that these things in the future may not occur. Now I wanted to take the opportunity of saying that what the right hon. Gentleman for East Worcestershire said a short time ago is what is generally understood to be the official view of the affair, namely, to keep everything out of the House you possibly can. That is all very well perhaps from the right hon. Gentleman's point of view, but not from our point of view. While we do not wish to condemn generally, we desire to keep the power to criticise everybody and everything in connection with the Government of this country. We desire to represent the people against all comers, and it is well to bear in mind that everybody, from the Prime Minister downward, is an official under us, their masters. I am only anxious to do justice to them. Somebody said something about the postmen. I wish to acknowledge that he is an excellent official. He is courteous, and he endeavours in every possible way to carry out his duty. I am unaware that there is any complaint whatever against the postmen in this country. I never met anybody who did not acknowledge what a good set of fellows they were, and how anxious they were to do their duty and to please everybody. And there is no official to whom we are more willing to give

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    a Christmas box than to the postman. Wherever that custom has been done away with I am more sorry than otherwise. Notwithstanding that the Postmaster-General deems it that I want to make an attack upon him, I say I want to freely acknowledge that this is the only Department which I have been able to get anything out of. Although he commenced in rather a bad temper to-night—
    Mr. BUXTON: No, no.
    Mr. MORTON: I am speaking of tonight. I want to freely assure him that he has done his best to carry out the business better than any other Postmaster-General I know of, and especially in districts like Sutherlandshire, which have been greatly neglected, and in which there are a great many improvements wanted which other Postmaster-Generals have failed to carry out. I know they give as reasons that in a district like Sutherlandshire it does not pay. A system of penny or twopenny post always implies that the better districts—I mean the more largely-populated districts—pay better than other districts which are not so great, and, therefore, it is not a bad argument in connection with the postal service to say we cannot do so and so because it does not pay like in other districts. I am greatly indebted to the right hon. Gentleman for the way in which he has listened to many complaints which I have brought forward on account of the services in Sutherlandshire, and he has tried to remedy a great many of them. He has not done all I wanted, and I do not know that he will do all I want in this Parliament, but I admit freely that he has acted very fairly and reasonably and generously so far as I have placed representations before him from my Constituents. Now, my attention has been called to this reduction of wages in future. Some time ago I brought before the right hon. Gentleman the question of the wages of the postmen and their position under this Hobhouse Commission at Brora, and I presented a petition on the matter. I understood the right hon. Gentleman at that time to say that he was going to reconsider the matter with regard to Brora. I have since had information—in fact, today—that they have settled the question of Brora without any reconsideration whatever, and they have reduced the maximum from 22s. to 21s., and it is held in at least three districts—Brora, Golspie, and Dornoch—that the cost of living there
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    is even greater than in Glasgow, where the maximum is 29s. against 21s. in these other places. Therefore I would like to ask whether the right hon. Gentleman will consider or reconsider this question? After all, a guinea a week is not much, and it is very difficult indeed for a man anywhere, I should think, to keep himself and family decently on 21s. a week. And I think my right hon. Friend ought to reconsider this case, because it was never intended by the Hobhouse Committee that wages should be reduced. The idea was, if possible, to increase them, and to give a living wage, but now it appears they are making a great diminution in some places at any rate. Now, I should also like to ask the right hon. Gentleman when he is going to give us the penny post between this country and France and Germany and some other countries? A little while ago he was good enough to arrange for a penny post to the United States, and a very little while after the German Government came to a similar arrangement with regard to the United States. While you give a penny post to India, to all parts of Canada, and to all parts of the United States, it does seem absurd that you should keep up the 2½d. post between this country and Germany and France and some other countries. I suppose the right hon. Gentleman thinks it will cost money. The opinion of those who know a great deal about the postal business is that, even if there was a loss in the first year, that would soon be made up. The same thing was said of the Colonial penny post, but as far as I have been able to make out there has been no actual loss at all.
    Mr. BUXTON: We have never recovered a penny of it yet.
    Mr. MORTON: That is not in accordance with the information I have. At any rate the right hon. Gentleman does not propose, and has not proposed, to go back to the old state of things, and I do not think he is likely to. I do think if we can send letters 10,000 or 12,000 miles for a penny, we might send them 60 or 70 miles for a penny instead of twopence-halfpenny. I am sure it would go far towards creating a better feeling altogether between this and other countries the more communication that we had by post or otherwise. The same thing applies to the charge for telegrams. It is twopence to France, and it should be a penny a word. I beg the right hon. Gentleman that having done al-

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    ready a good deal in this direction, he will endeavour to do a little more, and give us, at all events, between this country and France and Germany and other countries the penny postage that we have now got with the United States. I am very sorry to have apparently offended my right hon. Friend a little in the course of the discussion in the first part of the day, but I want to assure him, both on behalf of myself and my Constituency, I am extremely anxious to thank him for the services he has rendered to the county of Sutherland. I am sure he will agree with me that that fact should not prevent me from criticising any other matters in a reasonable way, and in any remarks I made, there was no intention to reflect upon the right hon. Gentleman in any shape or form whatever. I trust that he will be good enough to look into these questions in Sutherland, and do the best he can to give these men a decent opportunity of earning a living. Last night we agreed to the increase of ministers' salaries from £2,000 to £5,000, and I think we can reasonably believe that the Government can afford to give an extra shilling to the poor postmen.
    Mr. J. McKEAN: The hon. Member for Liverpool suggested that the maintenance of the Queenstown route was a job on the part of the Government, but if that is so it is a job to which the Opposition have been a party for several years. The hon. Member for Liverpool suggested that instead of this, we in Ireland should get some money, but the hon. Member for the City of London said that we got sufficient money. Evidently the hon. Member for the City of London is very easily satisfied when it is a question of paying his just and lawful debts. It has been proved to demonstration that although the cessation to call at Queenstown and the direct passage from Liverpool to New York might convenience Liverpool and some of the adjacent districts, it has been proved to demonstration by the people who know that for the convenience of the City of London, and for the convenience of England and Wales generally, the present route is by far the superior route. I hope that the right hon. Gentleman will, therefore, resist all the advances and suggestions made to him to make any alteration in the existing state of affairs. The subjects I rose to speak about are local matters, and I should like to call attention to the fact that in Carrickmacross the status of the Post Office has been reduced, involving, as it does, a reduction in the scale of payment
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    of those very deserving officials the postmen. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will let me know whether it is a fact that this change has been made in a town in which the population is increasing. I hear also from Ballybay that it is complained that the postmen of Monaghan and Castle-blayney have got an increase of 1s. a week and the Ballybay postmen have not got this increase. I hope the right hon. Gentleman will try to equalise matters as between these towns.
    I wish also to say a word on the salaries of women clerks in Ireland. In London and Dublin they enter the service through the same open competition and by the same examination. They perform the very same duties in London and Dublin and serve the same hours, and enjoy the same privileges, yet the London woman clerk has a higher scale of salary than her Dublin colleague. I do not think that is fair. I said the work of the two was identical, but, as a matter of fact, the work in Dublin is more onerous than that in London. The clerk in London is commonly employed on one branch of work, she becomes expert at it, and it becomes easy to her, whereas in Dublin, the amount of work being less, the sub-division of labour is not required there, and the women clerks in Dublin have to perform a variety of duties, so that, if anything, I submit the pay in Ireland should be higher. I also drew the attention of the right hon. Gentleman some time ago to the case of the assistant postal officials in Kingstown. They are paid at a much lower rate than in Dublin, and the facilities for bettering their position are considerably lower than those who perform exactly the same work in Dublin. The right hon. Gentleman before said that the amount of work they do in Kingstown is less, but that is not their fault, and they would willingly perform the amount of work which is done by their Dublin colleagues if they had it to do. I respectfully submit that the Hobhouse Committee, who are responsible for these changes, can hardly be congratulated on the result of the steps that have been taken. I have a few matters to speak about with reference to the Post Office Savings Bank in Ireland. I am sure, by the way, that the right hon. Gentleman is a Home Ruler, at all events if he is like his colleagues he is very ardent and strong in his profession of Home Rule, but when it comes to practice we find that they are not quite so strong or so practical in applying as they are in professing it. Take a case in point where we ask for Home

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    Rule in Ireland. I am sure the Members of the Government, who have made no pledges against giving us this instalment of Home Rule, will be able to see their way to grant it. All the work of the Post Office Savings Bank is transacted in Kensington. The Postmaster-General will not deny that some of the principal and most trusted officials in the Post Office in Dublin are opposed to this system. The work ought to be done in Ireland. It can be done in Ireland. The officials in Ireland are not less efficient and not less hard-working or trustworthy than the men in London. It stands to common-sense the maintenance of buildings in Dublin is less than in London. The transactions in Ireland mainly relate to accounts opened in Irish offices, and, therefore, the alleged delays in communicating with the head office, if there was one in Dublin, would only affect depositors residing in England with accounts opened in Ireland. The Irish depositor has to wait until the matter is referred to London before the business is transacted. I would suggest to the right hon. Gentleman the appointment of a small Committee to inquire and report upon this important question. For years it was contended in this House by the right hon. Gentleman's predecessors in office that the head office work of dealing with postal orders could not be transferred from London to Dublin. Yet this change has been made, I think, by the right hon. Gentleman himself. Within the past two years the impossible and impracticable transfer, as it was called, was accomplished, and a staff of women clerks are now working in Dublin duties previously done in London. The Hobhouse Committee unanimously favoured the policy of decentralisation in the Post Office. Here in a matter concerning Ireland depositors have to wait for days to recover their money from the bank owing to its administrative staff being centred in London. These are not wildly revolutionary suggestions, and I would respectfully suggest to the right hon. Gentleman, if he is not too much of a slave of the permanent officials and of tradition, that he would consider whether they could be carried out or not.
    I wish also to say one or two words on the subject of the franking of letters. I think a Government which professes to be in favour of payment of Members of Parliament, and a Government, some, if not all, of whose Members made speeches
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    declaring that they were in favour of the payment of Members of Parliament, might concede the very natural and the very reasonable right or privilege of having letters on public matters on the part of Members of the House franked. Ministers are paid very good salaries, though not any too high. I am sure every Minister earns his salary, and I am sure the right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster-General earns his salary perhaps better than any other Minister. I do not think there is any more hard-worked or more attentive, and, at the same time, more courteous Minister than the Postmaster-General. I remember well in that connection when right hon. Gentlemen were in Opposition they were very friendly, very courteous, and very affable. They used even to speak to myself. A lot of them do not see me now. They do not know me since they got on the Treasury Bench. [An HON. MEMBEB: "Name."] The hon. Gentleman wants to know too much. He is never satisfied with moderate information. Ministers are paid very handsome salaries for performing their duties, and, in addition to this, they have the right or the privilege of having their letters sent post free. A fortiori, ordinary Members, who are not paid, should have their letters sent post free to those who write to them on public business. It is not a very great matter A thousand pounds a year would cover the whole thing, and it would be a considerable advantage to Members. But not even that concession would this Liberal Government make to Members of the House. One Member of the Government made a strong speech in favour of payment of Members of Parliament some four years ago. The hon. Member for Barnard Castle brought forward the subject in a Resolution, and the present Minister for Foreign Affairs delivered a speech which meant, if words or actions mean anything, that when they came back to office they would do something practical in that matter. But people feel differently, or if they do not they talk differently when they get into office from what they do when they are in the cold shades of opposition.
    The DEPUTY-CHAIRMAN (Mr. Caldwell): Payment of Members does not arise under this Vote.
    Mr. McKEAN: My argument is that since they do not pay Members of Parliament directly, they ought to make this concession, which comes relevantly and naturally under the Post Office Vote, and

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    it is to show that they are bound by their pledges, and their promises and their professions to do this that I introduced the question of payment of Members of Parliament. I have never met a more courteous class of men than the postal officials. There is no detail that they will not enter into. They are the pink of courtesy and politeness. The same remark applies with an equal force to the principal officials in Dublin, most of whom I have the pleasure of knowing. There are two whom I should like to mention by name. One is Mr. Egerton, the Secretary of the General Post Office, and I think the public service does not contain a more hard working or a more attentive, or a more courteous official than Mr. Egerton, and the same remarks apply with equal force to the head of the Accountants' Department, Mr. James MacMahon. I wish all officials were like these two in particular, and like the officials of the Post Office in general. The right hon. Gentleman to whose attention I have often brought various matters has never been able to do one single thing that I wished him to do, but he has always extended to me unlimited quantities of that commodity which is so plentiful on the Liberal Benches, and that is sympathy. I want to ask him where the Liberal Government keep their sympathy, because I would like to spend two or three days walking about the apartment. It must be a very large place. I hope that in future the right hon. Gentleman will be able to give us something more practical and consoling than mere sympathy.
    Mr. CHARLES FENWICK: My main object in rising is because I think the voice of Northumberland should not be silent in a general appeal made to the Postmaster-General. I never cared much about intervening in Debates of this description, because I share the view expressed by my hon. Friend the Member for Leicester when he said that more can be obtained from Ministers behind the Speaker's chair than by challenge on the floor of the House. I admit that there is a great deal of force in that observation, and hence I prefer to do a great deal of the work I have to do behind the Speaker's chair. If nobody speaks from Northumberland my right hon. Friend will think that we are perfectly satisfied with what he has done for us. He has done something, and we appreciate very highly what he has done. There has been in four of the centres an
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    increase of the standard, and for that I am personally grateful, and I am sure that those who have obtained the benefit of the change are equally grateful. There are some places where the standard has been reduced, and the members of the staff whom I have consulted fail to see on what ground an increase has been given in some places when a reduction under similar circumstances has taken place in others. We were assured that no reduction would take place until full and careful inquiry had been made both as to the cost of living, and as to the units of work. I defy any person to show that either the cost of living is greater in those centres where an advance has taken place or that the units of labour there are at all different or in any essential degree different from those in the places where the reduction has taken place. I take the case of Cramlington in my own Division, where the standard has been reduced from 24s. to 23s. per week. I take also the case of Seaton Delaval, a large centre of industry. In these two centres of industry I should imagine you have anywhere from 12,000 to 15,000 inhabitants, and the cost of living is not less in either of these places than in the neighbouring districts where an advance has been given. All those districts lie within a radius of ten or a dozen males of each other, and I venture to suggest to my right hon. Friend that in the case of Blythe probably the cost of living is greater because house rents are higher than in some places where the standard has been increased from 23s. to 24s. per week. What I am particularly anxious to emphasise on this occasion is the observation made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bury. I am one of those who from the very first when this change took place believed that it was a step in the wrong direction. I cannot think it will ultimately lead either to peace within the Department or to efficiency. There is nothing that workmen dislike more than to feel that they are called upon to perform similar duties in every respect, and to discharge similar responsibilities, and yet not be entitled to receive the same remuneration for their labour as their fellow-workmen are receiving. Nothing, it seems to me, is more calculated to endanger the peaceful cooperation of the members of the Postal service with the heads of the various Departments than this disparity of wages. It is perfectly true that the reduction which has taken place does not affect that portion of the staff in existence when the

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    change was made, but to introduce a lower standard of pay seems to me to be one of the worst things you can do from the point of view of the peaceful relationship between the Postal servants and the heads of the various departments. It is a totally different thing to reward a man for long service or for efficient service where exactly similar duties and similar responsibilities are to be borne by the rest of the staff. I cannot help emphasising the force of the observation which was made by my hon. Friend. I do hope—and this is my main point—that some further inquiry will be made where this reduction or alteration has taken place. So far as the county of Northumberland is concerned, we have not been able to ascertain from any authoritative source that any inquiry, except the most cursory inquiry indeed, was made before this change was brought into operation. In order that you may have good relationship existing between the Postal servants and the heads of departments I think you ought to take every precaution so as to ensure that a careful inquiry will be made in every detail before such great changes are introduced. I have a case in my mind where a man, 18 years of age, is in receipt of 17s. per week. He is a single man. That is his total income, and out of that he has to pay 13s. per week for his board and lodging. What is there left after that for the young man to clothe and educate himself if he is anxious at all to cultivate the faculties of his mind? I say such a salary is too low, and I hope that careful and thorough investigation will be instituted by the Postmaster-General with a view to remedying these cases of hardship wherever it is possible to do so.
    Mr. CATHCART WASON: As I listened to the Debate this afternoon the feeling in my mind was that I wished I had got only the same things to complain of as other places. I represent a Constituency which I will not say has been persistently neglected by the Post Office, because the Postmaster-General who now fills that office has done more for us than his predecessors, and in giving us a weekly mail for the Shetland Islands has conferred a very great boon on the whole of the inhabitants of that country. It makes a great difference to the people on these islands, especially during the winter months, and has improved their position very materially. But with regard to telegraphic communication our difficulties are just where they were. We have large and important islands abso-
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    lutely destitute of telegraphic communication at the present moment. Some of these islands with running up to 400 to 500 inhabitants have only a limited mail service of once a week or fortnight, and have no telegraphic communication. Some of these islands have no doctor and no nurse. Those people are cut off entirely from the outside world. Only a short time ago a very serious wreck occurred there, in which all the lives were lost, and it is credibly asserted, and I believe, that if they had been able to communicate with the mainland a very considerable number of lives would have been able to be saved, and probably the ship. The Postmaster-General told us some time ago he was inquiring into the matter, to see if he cannot establish wireless telegraphy with those islands. I can assure him it is a matter of the utmost need in these days when something should be done to prevent people from going to foreign countries and induce them to stay in their own country. The people of these islands are willing to pay a considerable sum themselves, and the Congested Districts Board for Scotland has also adopted a very sympathetic attitude, so that I sincerely trust that the Postmaster-General will see his way to put the people in those islands in a very much better position than they are at present with reference to the outside world. It will not cost very much money—a mere bagatelle of a few hundred a year—and the Postmaster-General could still effect a great saving by economies on the extravagant generosity under which £9,000 a year is spent on the mail service between Aden and Mombassa.
    The answers which the right hon. Gentleman have given me in the House will prove what I say. This service costs over £9,000 a year, and we only receive about £2,000, so that there is a loss of £7,000 a year; and then everyone I have met in that part of the world is extremely dissatisfied with the service. For whose benefit it is carried on no one possibly knows unless it is for the direct benefit of the steamship company itself. It does not connect with anybody; it does not connect with our country; it does not benefit the trade of the nation, and it is not of the least use. There is £7,000 a year which the Postmaster-General could quite well save, and which would go a very long way towards providing the islands and highlands of Scotland with much more satisfactory communication than they have at the present moment, and do something to relieve the disability under which we labour in

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    that respect. Another large saving might be effected by the Post Office in reference to the Sunday service. It is a question which I have often brought before the right hon. Gentleman, especially as to Scotland, and I wish to reiterate to-day the remarks I have made before on this matter. At the present time in Scotland you have got many deliveries on Sunday which could well be done without in country districts. We do not have them in town districts; we do not have them in London here, and we get on perfectly well without the Sunday Post Office service here; but in Scotland, above all places, where the observance of Sunday is supposed to prevail, we have those services in various parts of the country. In addition to the postmen who are employed, there is the question of the people in the Post Offices, who almost never get a Sunday holiday in the year, and if they wish to go to service in a church or in the open air they are compelled to wait until certain hours of the day to attend those services. In those two respects alone you can save far more money than the trifling amount which we are asking for in respect of the improved telegraphic and mail service to these islands.
    Mr. J. R. CLYNES: In reference to the question of sub-postmasters, I have received a communication in which I think a very serious grievance is expressed. It is stated that though in all other sections of the service where an increase is shown to be due the increase was antedated, from 1st January this year in this section no such antedating has been allowed, in spite of the Postmaster-General's direct statement that no officer of the Post Office would suffer loss because of the calculation of the increment when this Report was being made. In consequence of this they say that some of the sub-postmasters will lose nearly two years of their increase, just because their offices were among the last batch to be revised. If the statements in that communication are statements of fact, and if the Postmaster-General is correctly quoted, I think that that is a matter for his further attention. They point out that they were formerly paid upon what they term volume, and that the change of payment, which now rests upon the number of arrivals and despatches of mails, has been greatly to their detriment, and many of them are losing, or will lose, money which they can ill afford to lose. Much has been said in the course of the Debate in contrasting
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    two places where the same work is differently paid for. I am given to understand that comparisons could be drawn not only from two different towns, but from two different quarters of the same town. I am assured that Eltham is part of the borough of Woolwich, and that it can be proved that the cost of living in the two places is substantially the same, and yet the postmen are paid differently in the two places. I cannot understand why, and I agree with a previous speaker who has pointed out that although there might be some fine departmental reason, or, perhaps, some technical point that would justify differentiation, yet you cannot impress that kind of thing on the ordinary postman of to-day. I do not think you ought to try. The Postmaster-General in his speech this afternoon referred to the telephone transference question. Recently a meeting was held in Manchester in connection with the complaints of the men now employed by the Telephone Company. I attended that meeting. It was not a party meeting; indeed it was not a Labour meeting in the ordinary sense of the term; it was a meeting of employés who feared very much from some little experience, and from what they had heard, that this transference meant the dismissal of a large number. The right hon. Gentleman this afternoon said, as showing how little cause there was for fear, that there had been only one man dismissed during the present year. It was pointed out, however, later in the Debate that there was a cause for that. There was a sort of understanding that during the winter season these dismissals would not be continued. I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether in connection with this matter he has heard a rumour which has possessed these men with a sense of fear, to the effect that a large body of them are to be dismissed about Whitsuntide. I am assured by these men that many of them believe that when that time of the year arrives their services will be terminated, and they will have to take their chance of being re-engaged when the telephone service becomes State property. We have heard much in connection with unemployment discussions of the necessity of avoiding unemployment by giving men technical training and by teaching them, as it were, a trade. These telephone men are capable of performing with a high degree of skill valuable service, and it is not only the individual loss we have to contemplate, but also the loss to

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    the State which may arise if these men are thrown aside on the offchance of their being taken on again at the beginning of 1912, should the State require the benefit of their useful labour. The right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster-General has been justly congratulated already upon various matters, but there is one point which I think is new. When we were discussing some weeks ago the Fair Wage Clause, and also this afternoon in the course of the discussion of this Post Office Vote, the right hon. Gentleman gave the House on the previous and on this occasion a piece of information which I think must have escaped the notice of such hon. Gentlemen, at least, as the hon. Baronet the Member for the City of London. We hear a good deal about economic law, about the folly of tampering with the indisputable regulations and laws of industry, trade and commerce. We are told that we cannot wisely interfere with what must be the ordinary operation of supply and demand. But the right hon. Gentleman has swept aside all these considerations, and, without consulting this House, he has wisely and humanly settled that there shall be a minimum rate of wage given to the lowly paid workers in connection with the making of the uniforms and clothing of certain Civil servants. I am glad to think that the House has reached the point of being able to receive a decision like that, not only cheerfully but evidently with approval, and I hope this very good example and very good step taken administratively on the high responsibility, I assume, of the right hon. Gentleman, will be wisely followed by the House in general when it is called upon to give its approval to a measure which will have a similar end in view with regard to the workers in other trades.
    Mr. FREDERICK MADDISON: Some few years ago I supported to the best of my ability the demand of the postal employés for a Parliamentary inquiry, and I am bound to say that it is very disappointing to hear that the complaints which now exist seem to be as wide and as strong and sometimes as bitter as they were when we endeavoured to get that Parliamentary inquiry. We had the Hobhouse Committee, whose inquiry lasted a long time, and great care appears to have been taken I am bound to say, however, that the Committee attempted an almost impossible task. They tried to lay down some-
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    thing which in theory may appear to be all right, but in practice is almost impossible. The hon. Member for Wansbeek, in approaching this question from the standpoint of a trade union leader having to do with these matters, I think put his finger on the weak spot. After all, you could not possibly get a scientific remuneration on the dual basis of the cost of living and the unit of work. They are too complicated, and even if they were not quite so complicated, how on earth could you get as to workmen or anybody else—for in this matter it is always the workmen who are referred to, but it applies also to anybody else—this fine discrimination between this particular district and the other. I am not going to raise the question of Burnley. I always endeavour to resist with all my strength bringing sectionalism into this question; but the Postmaster-General may take it from me that as there is going to be a reduction in Burnley they will have a grievance there, and they will continue to have a grievance because of the mere fact that they are about to be reduced. The difficulty which the Committee experienced, or, as I think, the impossible task they attempted to impose on someone, was made still worse by the data which the Department had to go upon, namely, the inquiry that was held by the Board of Trade as to the cost of living in various towns. We had placed before us last year, and, I think, upon this occasion, where the standard of rent had been taken of the kind of houses you would not expect postmen to live in. It would be the easiest thing in the world for me—nothing could be easier—to get hold of some of the cheap rents in London, but they would not represent the average London rents? And when the Postmaster-General had to depend entirely for his information on that side of the dual basis upon the work of another Department, there you got a difficulty that was almost impossible to get over; because if there is one thing which prevails it is that one Department likes to accept loyally and at once the findings and investigations of another Department. There is that loyalty between them that works out, I suppose, in the main well, but, on a question like this, works out very ill. I was saying that the Postmaster-General, without going into details, has to make up his mind to this: that he has not had reliable information in the fixing of the cost of living. He may take that for granted. I would tell him that he must not shelter

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    himself behind this case or the other case that he could bring forward to upset certain statements made. Practically speaking, I feel convinced that sooner or later he must have a revision, and from not only the sympathetic way in which he has administered the affairs of his office, but as well the broad statesmanship with which he has dealt with these questions, I feel sure he will do so. It must have been a source of pride to hon. Members to know that in the recent trouble in France that actually in all of the speeches one could read they stated they were trying to get up to English models so far as combination was concerned, and that they despaired of doing so, but were trying to get as near as possible. The Parliamentary way has not been entirely successful, and you could not do anything that would satisfy all those tens of thousands of people. That would be humanly impossible. All that we can get is something that will take out of the domain of political influence the great broad question of wages, and the major labour conditions.
    The right hon. Gentleman the member for East Worcestershire I certainly thought proclaimed a piece of high state policy, not new, but none the worse for that, namely, that there should be some means devised by which these larger questions should be dealt with by a body such as a Conciliation Board that is outside the membership of this House. To talk about a Standing Committee of this House being entrusted with it would be absurd. Why, nothing was more deplorable to me than the treatment which some members of the Hobhouse Committee received in certain quarters. There is the case of the hon. Member for Stockport. I unfortunately disagree with him on many economic matters, but I read with the greatest pain attacks upon him in certain sets of newspapers—where his connection with the Labour party, his "professional Socialism" and a hundred and one ulterior things were brought in, and the hon. Member subjected to the sort of intimidation—for it was nothing else—that would make men hesitate to be on a Standing Committee which had to run the gauntlet on every occasion that they happened to revise wages.
    Therefore I do think that the right hon. Gentleman ought to seriously consider, and that he ought to press on the Prime Minister, the necessity for having a Com-
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    mittee of Inquiry to try and devise some sort of conciliation board or other tribunal by which those things could be dealt with. I want two things to be borne in mind, namely the supreme authority of the Postmaster-General in all matters of discipline to be maintained, and I also want the Treasury point of view not to be neglected. I quite understand a board of conciliation might, thinking it had to deal with the public purse, settle some of the questions in a way they would not do in a conciliation board that had to deal with railway companies. As to the great mass of people employed by the State, I think it is time that they should have some sort of right to a real effective method of dealing with disputes which have not lent themselves to ordinary treatment. The hon. Member for Sutherland talks of this being the "grand inquest of the nation." That is a splendid phrase, but does any hon. Member tell me that we ever have really dealt with questions of detail on the floor of this House? The majority cannot understand half the detailed oases given. This evening the hon. Member for the College Green Division of Dublin gave a list of details, and I would venture to say there is not 5 per cent. can remember one quarter of them, and therefore know nothing about them at all. Therefore I hope the right hon. Gentleman will see whether some better means cannot be devised.
    Then one word about another subject. I believe that one of the most serious elements in our economic condition at the present moment is the profligate waste of boy and youth labour, and those hon. Members who spoke on the subject of boy labour and telegraph messengers placed before the right hon. Gentleman a question—not a new one, and one he has under consideration—of the gravest importance. You take intelligent boys and give them only two, three, or four years' employment in a great Government Department, and then cast them aside, too old for apprenticeship, not men, and just in such a condition that unless they are very, careful they run to seed and form those from whom the ranks of the unemployed are recruited. The right hon. Gentleman must really understand that it is no use the Government bringing in a Bill or taking steps to deal "with boy labour if his Department does not even more than it is doing now. I have not a word to say against the ex-soldier; he is a man and a brother, and has every right to be treated properly;

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    but when it takes boys into its employment let the Post Office recognise the sort of duty that a decent employer would perform.
    Mr. BUXTON: I desire to thank hon. Members for the very kind words—in many cases too kind—they have used in reference to myself, and especially do I thank those hon. Members who have made reference to the Gentlemen with whom I have the honour to serve—I mean my permanent officials. I will take the smaller points shortly, before I deal with the questions which, I think, have really interested the Committee, namely, the question of classification and the suggestion of the right hon. Member for East Worcestershire. The hon. Member who moved the reduction of my salary—I hope he will not persist in his Motion, and that he will let me off more cheaply than that—and the hon. Member for Sutherland raised the question of French postage. The question is really one of money. At the present moment, when we shall have unfortunately to impose a considerable burden of taxation on the taxpayers, I do not think it would be fair to ask the Treasury to grant a very considerable sum for this particular purpose. It must be recollected by the Committee that this question necessarily carries with it penny postage to the rest of the Continent, which represents a sum of nearly £400,000. If I am sufficiently long at the Post Office, and if the Post Office finances—which I regret to say are not very flourishing just now—improve, not only shall I not hesitate to put the question before the Treasury, for it has my entire sympathy, but I shall point out that I have been very kind to them in not urging it at this time of pressure. I hope that I or my successor will be able to carry out this proposal, which I consider a very great postal improvement and reform. Then a question has been raised on various occasions by various Members. I referred to it in my opening remarks, namely, the position of the Post Office and the National Telephone Company. I really do not think I have anything to add to what I said except this: That the best solution probably of this problem, subject to certain conditions, would be to antedate the time when the Post Office takes over the company. I take that as endorsed by various Members, and I shall certainly now proceed, so far as I can, in the negotiations with the Telephone Company. Of course I do not at all know whether it
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    is possible to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion before the lease runs out.
    A point has been raised by one or two Members, by the Member for Liverpool and by one of the Irish Members—an important point. I refer to what is termed the Queenstown call. The hon. Member for Liverpool—perhaps I had better just say that the suggested proposal of the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce is that I should facilitate, if I can, by dropping the call at Queenstown, and by allowing the Cunard steamers to start earlier, the delivery of letters in America. The difficulty about that is, as I said in answer to a question yesterday, that with the exception of Liverpool and the immediate neighbourhood—which are naturally in favour of the suggestion—what would be the gain on the American side would be a loss on this side, and this loss would include London and other parts of the country. Therefore, under existing conditions, I am afraid I cannot consider the proposal. Well, my hon. Friend who spoke last, and other Members, the Member for Dublin included, referred to a question which I can assure them is one I have very much at heart, that is the question of the boy messengers of the Post Office. This is a matter to which I have given the greatest possible attention and anxiety during the three and a half years I have been at the Post Office. I have, I think, expressed this on a former occasion in this way: It is a real blot on the escutcheon of the Post Office. It is not our fault, because for many years past, under the arrangement of the Government of that time, every other postman's place was to be allotted to an ex-soldier. That was looked at from the point of view of the Government as a whole, for they felt that the Government, having employed the soldier for a good many years, ought not to throw him out if they could find some place for him. If it were not for this arrangement we should have no difficulty whatever in finding places for every good, well-conducted boy that we took into our service. But unfortunately that is not so now. The Committee must not think I am casting any reflection on the ex-soldier. I am simply dealing with the conditions as they exist at present. What I have endeavoured to do is this: In the first place, I have made an arrangement with the War Office—they pressed me rather hard to take more ex-soldiers—but I said I could not really allow a larger proportion of

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    ex-soldiers to come into the service. I asked them—and they were good enough to agree—that Instead of necessarily putting an ex-soldier into a postman's place, that I might be able to put them to other branches of the service. That, to a certain extent, we have been able to do, thus setting free postmen's places for the boys. Further, we have endeavoured, so far as we could, to take some of these boys into the engineering branches, and so on; and we have so far as we can also endeavoured to provide within the service itself for a larger proportion of those boys than what was the case a few years ago. I think my right hen. Friend will think, at all events, that while we are not neglecting the old soldiers, we are doing all we can to meet the difficulty of a really serious problem which confronts us with regard to boy labour. In addition to that we do our very best, if we have to part with the services of these boys, to find situations for them. So far as my inquiries go, I am glad to state that we are able to find employment for them, or, by our assistance, they are, in the majority of cases, able to find employment for themselves. It is not the Post Office boy messenger who adds to the number of unemployed and casual and unemployable boys who unfortunately come upon the streets. That is a matter I have very much at heart, and I shall be very glad to have any suggestion that my hon. Friend or others can make to enable me to deal more effectually with it. I repeat that it is not a case of turning these boys out of our service so much as it is due to the fact that we are limited to a very large extent by what would be the alternative if we did not deal with the boy messengers in this way, namely, that a very large number of ex-soldiers would be turned into the streets. My hon. Friend the Member for Islington raised two or three questions to which he wanted an answer. One was with reference to the early attendance of postmen. I regret very much that these early attendances should be necessary, but unfortunately the pressure of work and the large increase in correspondence in the City necessitates earlier attendance on the part of a certain number of postmen, but they are only a small proportion of the whole of the postmen. We are making inquiries, and seeing how far we can improve the conditions of service, and I can assure my hon. Friend we shall do our best to make what I admit is a serious burden upon them as easy as we can. The hon. Member for Orkney and
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    Shetland and the hon. Member for Islington pressed upon me the advisability, as far as possible, of reducing Sunday labour. I am with them in the desire, as far as possible to do so, and as my hon. Friend knows, when any district is itself willing to dispense with Sunday labour we are only too glad to meet its wishes and to cease to give a Sunday delivery. I am glad to say that not long ago I represented to the great city of Glasgow that the number of persons who called for their letters at certain hours on Sundays did not seem to be very great, and that the delivery to callers on Sundays should be abolished. I am glad to say that the Corporation of Glasgow, the Lord Provost, and others met me in the matter, and at the present time Glasgow is in the same happy position as London in having no Sunday delivery. I am glad to say also that, with regard to Sunday delivery in Aberdeen, they have met us to some extent. The hon. Member for North-East Manchester mentioned the question of sub-postmasters. I understand him to say that they complain that their revisions were somewhat delayed. That is in strict accordance with the distinct recommendation of the Parliamentary Committee in paragraph 533, which was founded on the fact that that would necessarily take some time. I can assure the hon. Member we have, as far as we could, hurried on the revisions, so that the improved scale of pay—in a very large proportion of cases there is an increase of pay for sub-postmasters—should come into force at the earliest possible moment. I think those are all the minor points which hon. Members have referred to.
    Mr. C. E. PRICE: The right hon. Gentleman has omitted to deal with underground telegraphs.
    Mr. BUXTON: At the present moment, as I have already stated, we are extending underground telegraph works. I wish to point out to my hon. Friend that every additional mile of underground telegraph wire is an advantage to every part of the Kingdom It really is not a local question, because to a large extent the work is carried out in connection with our submarine cables. We desire to bring the underground protective wire as near as we can to the place of landing of the submarine cable. With regard to the argument that some particular underground line ought to be taken in hand before another we have to decide the question from what I may

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    perhaps be allowed to call the Post Office strategic point of view.
    I will now deal with "classification"— a question which has exercised the minds of a large number of hon. Members, and I will deal with it shortly, because I have discussed it on more than one occasion in this House, and I have endeavoured to put forward the reasons and the grounds which have actuated myself and the Post Office in this connection. I quite appreciate what has been said by those hon. Members who have raised the case of their own particular constituencies in which there will, in the future, be a slight reduction in the maximum pay. I think they ought to recollect that in this matter I am in a very difficult position. A Parliamentary Committee was appointed at the desire of the staff, and it gave the greatest possible care and trouble to this question, and made certain recommendations which I believe I have carried out both in the spirit and the letter. Without discussing the actual merits of it, the recommendation was that the classification ought to be based on units of work and the cost of living. That, at all events, was the recommendation of the Committee after careful consideration, and a good many hon. Members who have spoken in regard to it have not, I think, studied the question as much as the Committee did in regard to that point. I am not going to enter into the question whether the classification ought to be put upon that basis, but that was the recommendation of the Committee, and I felt bound to carry it out. They also recommended the system of classification which was to combine the existing systems. It is obvious that if you have two existing systems of classification which are not the same, and you combine them into one, it must cause an adverse effect in some places and give an advantage in other offices which come under those classifications, and the Committee recognised that that must be so. I regret that the endeavour to carry out a uniform classification should have involved a certain number of reductions in a limited number of cases, but I think this question should be considered as a whole, and not as it affects individual cases. In no less than 4,400 cases postmen receive an immediate increase in the maximum, whereas in the other cases, if there is a diminution, none of the existing officers suffer from that diminution. I do not think that the hon.
    300
    Member who has referred to the Irish figures could have been properly informed, because in Ireland there are an infinitesimal number of cases of reduction, while there are many cases of increase, because the Committee felt that the scale in Ireland was unduly low. That is the position. Various Members have appealed to me with regard to their constituents. I can only say if it can be shown that the basis is unjust between one town as against another the matter shall receive my consideration. As regards the remarks of the hon. Member for Burnley with reference to the cost of living, the cost of living is a matter over which I have no control. No one at the Post Office knows what the cost of living is in any particular town. I should say as a general proposition that every Member represents the dearest town in the Kingdom, and speaking in my own case I may say that the cost of living is much higher than I should like it to be. I understand that the Board of Trade take the towns as a whole with regard to rent and compare one town with other towns. They do not profess to take—
    Mr. JOHN WARD: In a case with which I am acquainted they selected the worst streets of the district for the purpose of calculating what is the cost of the living of the working classes. If they have adopted that system throughout the country they have not carried out the intentions of the Committee.
    Mr. BUXTON: I cannot go into that. The Board of Trade has no interest in the cost of living, and whether the cost be high or low it does not affect the Board of Trade. The member for Stockport wants to know whether the matter is as unchangeable as the laws of the Medes and Persians? No one would contend that it was. Alterations are made from time to time in the ordinary way, and to that extent so far as alterations are made, of course the alteration in classification will follow. But I venture to say that what has occurred this afternoon and this evening, and what occurred last year, very much leads up to and emphasises what fell from the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire. I thought his speech a singularly interesting one, but he, of course, in his proposals was dealing with the general Civil Service. Speaking only for the Post Office, it would not be right or proper that I should make any pronouncement with regard

    301
    to this question; but I venture to agree with him and with the hon. Member for Stockport that this is a question of great moment to Members of this House, and it is a matter on which if there was general agreement that there would be something substantial to the advantage of both employer and employed, something should be done. I think it is quite clear that it is a matter which can only be dealt with by general consent. I think the proposal of the right hon. Gentleman met with approval in all quarters of the House. There was one proposal made in the course of the Debate. The right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire, as I understand, suggested—and it was endorsed by the hon. Member for Stockport—something in the nature of an arbitration or conciliation board on which both sides would be represented. That was to deal with the questions of hours and wages. But another suggestion was made that there should be a Standing Committee of this House appointed for the purpose of assisting the Postmaster-General. I think that would prove an impossible proposal. In the first place, I do not think it would be easy to find Members to serve on such a Committee. If Members suffer at the present moment through the letters and communications they receive, what would be the life of an unfortunate Member of such a Standing Committee of the House of Commons? Besides, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman the Member for East Worcestershire, that no self-respecting Postmaster-General—and I hope I am one myself—could serve as Chairman of such a Parliamentary Committee, which would attend to and interfere in his administration. I think there is in addition to that a really fatal objection to it. After all, fortunately at present the House of Commons does not sit the whole 12 months round. There is a certain time when the House of Commons is not sitting, and during that time the House of Commons Committees cease to exist, and I can only say, as representing the Post Office, that the Post Office never ceases, and there are only about nine days a year when the office is shut and the Postmaster-General free of work. How is he then to get along during the three or four months when the House is not sitting and when this Committee would have closed its doors? A Committee of the House of Commons is outside the question. The proposal of the right hon. Member
    302
    was very different. It was somewhat on the lines of the Railway Conciliation Boards, dealing with the questions of wages and hours of labour. I think he carefully excluded from such a Committee all questions of administration. I do not think it is possible for anybody except the Minister to have charge of the administration of his own Department. All I can say with regard to the matter is that I have no authority whatever for giving an opinion in regard to it. It obviously is a matter not for my Department, but for the Government, but I shall certainly convey to the Prime Minister and to my colleagues what has fallen in the course of this Debate, and the obvious feeling which exists in this House, that if something in the nature of an arbitration or conciliation board, or something of that sort could be set up it would certainly relieve this House from personal difficulty to a very large extent, it would be fair not only to the Government, but to the employés, and if some such proposal could be accepted and met with approval, in my opinion it would be of advantage to all parties concerned. I thank the Committee for allowing me to make these various remarks in answer to the various points raised.
    Mr. HAY: Would the right hon. Gentleman answer about the Board of Works and the Treasury?
    Mr. BUXTON: I thought the hon. Member was not here. I had some notes as to what he said, but I had passed the point. The position is this: We have not seen our way, nor has the Treasury seen their way, to adopt the full proposal of the Committee, as contained in that clause to which the hon. Gentleman referred, but we do find that periodical meetings with the Office of Works, and so on, and the fact that we now have an architectural adviser of our own, for "half-crown" offices, as they are called, we are enabled to get rid of the difficulty and delay which occurred before, and upon which the Committee remarked quite rightly and strongly. We have the matter under consideration as to whether we should extend the proposal, but we have not so far been able to adopt the whole of the recommendations of the Committee.
    Mr. HAY: That relates to the Office of Works, but about the Treasury?
    Mr. BUXTON: It is the same thing.
    Mr. HAY: Am I to understand that he is in communication with the Treasury with a view to freeing himself from Treasury control?
    Mr. BUXTON: We have been in communication with the Treasury and considered the matter very carefully with the Treasury, but we have not seen our way at the present moment, and we do not think it would be an advantage to carry out that particular recommendation of the Committee. We have done so much in other directions that we think we have succeeded in obtaining the result which the Committee wished us to obtain.
    Mr. SEDDON: Did I correctly understand the right hon. Gentleman when he was making his former observations that he had calculated that a man who is on the 28s. maximum receives, in other things the
    equivalent of 10s. 1d. per week? What does that 10s. 1d. include? Is there something more besides doctor and boots?
    Mr. BUXTON: I have the Paper, but I cannot lay my hands upon it at present. What I said was that, taking the average postman of 13 years' service, with his stripes, with boot money and uniform and sick pay and pension and allowances for holidays, for doctors and one or two other small items, the addition to his maximum in cash, or its equivalent, is about 10s. 1d. I think that covers the various points, though there may be one or two other minor matters.
    Question put: "That Item A (Chief Offices) be reduced by £500."
    The Committee divided: Ayes, 61; Noes, 204.

    Division No. 75.]

    AYES.

    [10.58 p.m.

    Acland-Hood, Rt. Hon. Sir Alex. F.

    Gill, A. H.

    Renwick, George

    Anson, Sir William Reynell

    Glover, Thomas

    Richards, T. F. (Wolverhampton, W.)

    Ashley, W. W.

    Guinness, Hon. R. (Haggerston)

    Ronaldshay, Earl of

    Balcarres, Lord

    Hamilton, Marquess of

    Rutherford, W. W. (Liverpool)

    Banbury, Sir Frederick George

    Hardie, J. Keir (Merthyr Tydvil)

    Salter, Arthur Clavell

    Barnes, G. N.

    Harrlson-Broadley, H. B.

    Smith, F. E. (Liverpool, Walton)

    Beach, Hon. Michael Hugh Hicks

    Hay, Hon. Claude George

    Stanier, Beville

    Bignold, Sir Arthur

    Helmsley, Viscount

    Starkey, John R.

    Bridgeman, W. Clive

    Hodge, John

    Staveley-Hill, Henry (Staffordshire)

    Carlile, E. Hildred

    Hodge, Sir Robert Hermon-

    Talbot, Lord E. (Chichester)

    Cave, George

    Kerry, Earl of

    Talbot, Rt. Hon. G. J. (Oxford Univ.)

    Clive, Percy Archer

    Keswick, William

    Valentia, Viscount

    Coates, Major E. F. (Lewisham)

    Lockwood, Rt. Hon. Lt.-Col. A, R;

    Walker, Col. W. H. (Lancashire)

    Cochrane, Hon. Thomas H. A. E.

    Macpherson, J. T

    Walrond, Hon. Lionel

    Dalrymple, Viscount

    M'Arthur, Charles

    Wiles, Thomas

    Dickson, Rt. Hon. C. Scott-

    Morpeth, Viscount

    Wilson, A. Stanley (York, E.R.)

    Douglas, Rt. Hon. A. Akers-

    Newdegate, F. A.

    Wilson, W. T. (Westhoughton)

    Du Cros, Arthur

    O'Grady, J.

    Duncan, C (Barrow-in-Furness)

    Pirie, Duncan V.

    Duncan, Robert (Lanark, Govan)

    Pretyman, E. G.

    TELLERS FOR THE AYES.—Sir E. Sassoon and Mr. Harmood-Banner.

    Felt, Arthur

    Ratcliff, Major R. F.

    Gibbs, G. A. (Bristol, West)

    Rawlinson, John Frederick Peel

    NOES.

    Abraham, W. (Cork, N.E.)

    Causton, Rt. Hon. Richard Knight

    Elibank, Master of

    Acland, Francis Dyke

    Cawley, Sir Frederick

    Esmonde, Sir Thomas

    Agnew, George William

    Chance, Frederick William

    Essex, R. W.

    Allen, A. Acland (Christchurch)

    Cheetham, John Frederick

    Esslemont, George Birnie

    Allen, Charles P. (Stroud)

    Cherry, Rt. Hon. R. R.

    Evans, Sir Samuel T.

    Balfour, Robert (Lanark)

    Churchill, Rt. Hon. Winston S.

    Everett, R. Lacey

    Baring, Godfrey (Isle of Wight)

    Clough, William

    Falconer, J.

    Barlow, Percy (Bedford)

    Clynes, J. R.

    Fenwick, Charles

    Barran, Sir John Nicholson

    Cobbold, Felix Thornley

    Ferens, T. R.

    Beale, W. P.

    Collins, Sir Wm. J. (St. Pancras, W.)

    Findlay, Alexander

    Beauchamp, E.

    Compton-Rickett, Sir J.

    Fuller, John Michael F.

    Beck, A. Cecil

    Cooper, G. J.

    Fullerton, Hugh

    Bell, Richard

    Corbett, C. H. (Sussex, E. Grinstead)

    Glen-Coats, Sir T. (Renfrew, W.)

    Bellairs, Canyon

    Cotton, Sir H. J. S.

    Gooch, George Peabody (Bath)

    Benn, W. (Tower Hamlets, St. Geo.)

    Cowan, W. H.

    Greenwood, G. (Peterborough)

    Bennett, E. N.

    Crooks, William

    Gulland, John W.

    Bowerman, C. W.

    Curran, Peter Francis

    Hall, Frederick

    Bramsdon, T. A.

    Davies, Ellis William (Eiflon)

    Harcourt, Rt. Hon. L. (Rossendale)

    Brigg, John

    Devlin, Joseph

    Harcourt, Robert V. (Montrose)

    Bright, J. A.

    Dewar, Sir J. A. (Inverness-sh.)

    Haslam, James (Derbyshire)

    Brocklehurst, W. B.

    Dickinson, W. H. (St. Pancras, N.)

    Haslam, Lewis (Monmouth)

    Brooke, Stopford

    Dobson, Thomas W.

    Haworth, Arthur A.

    Brunner, J. F. L. (Lancs., Leigh)

    Duckworth, Sir James

    Hayden, John Patrick

    Bryce, J. Annan

    Duffy, William J.

    Hedges, A. Paget

    Burt, Rt. Hon. Thomas

    Dunne, Major E. Martin (Walsall)

    Helme, Norval Watson

    Buxton, Rt. Hon. Sydney Charles

    Edwards, Enoch (Hanley)

    Henderson, J. McD. (Aberdeen, W.)

    Carr-Gomm, H. W.

    Edwards, Sir Francis (Radnor)

    Henry, Charles S.

    Herbert, Col. Sir Ivor (Hon. S.)

    Montagu, Hon. E. S.

    Seely, Colonel

    Herbert, T. Arnold (Wycombe)

    Mooney, J. J.

    Shipman, Dr. John G.

    Higham, John Sharp

    Morton, Alpheus Cleophas

    Simon, John Allsebrook

    Hobart, Sir Robert

    Murray, Capt. Hon. A. C. (Kincard)

    Soares, Ernest J.

    Hobhouse, Charles E. H.

    Nannetti, Joseph P.

    Spicer, Sir Albert

    Hogan, Michael

    Newnes, F. (Notts, Bassetlaw)

    Stanger, H. Y.

    Holland, Sir William Henry

    Nicholls, George

    Stanley, Albert (Staffs., N.W.)

    Hooper, A. G.

    Nicholson, Charles N. (Doncaster)

    Stanley, Hon. A. Lyulph (Cheshire)

    Hope, John Deans (Fife, West)

    Nolan, Joseph

    Stoadman, W. C.

    Hope, W. H. B. (Somerset, N.)

    Norman, Sir Henry

    Strachey, Sir Edward

    Horniman, Emslie John

    Norton, Capt. Cecil William

    Straus, B. S. (Mile End)

    Hutton, Alfred Eddison

    Nussey, Thomas Willans

    Sutherland, J. E.

    Hyde, Clarendon G.

    Nuttall, Harry

    Tennant, Sir Edward (Salisbury)

    Jones, Sir D. Brynmor (Swansea)

    O'Dowd, John

    Thompson, J. W. H. (Somerset, E.).

    Kearley, Sir Hudson E.

    O'Kelly, Conor (Mayo, N.)

    Tomkinson, James

    Kekewich, Sir George

    Pearce, Robert (Staffs, Leek)

    Toulmln, George

    Kelley, George D.

    Pearce, William (Limehouse)

    Trevelyan, Charles Philips

    Kilbride, Denis

    Pickersgill, Edward Hare

    Tuke, Sir John Batty

    King, Alfred John (Knutstord)

    Pollard, Dr. G. H.

    Ure, Rt. Hon. Alexander

    Lambert, George

    Ponsonby, Arthur A. W. H.

    Vivian, Henry

    Lamont, Norman

    Price, C. E, (Edinburgh, Central)

    Ward, John (Stoke upon Trent)

    Layland-Barrett, Sir Francis

    Rainy, A. Holland

    Wardle, George J.

    Lehmann, R. C.

    Redmond, William (Clare)

    Warner, Thomas Courtenay T.

    Lever, A. Levy (Essex, Harwich)

    Rendall, Athelstan

    Wason, John Cathcart (Orkney)

    Levy, Sir Maurice

    Richardson, A.

    Waterlow, D. S.

    Lyell, Charles Henry

    Ridsdale, E. A.

    Watt, Henry A.

    Macdonald, J. R. (Leicester)

    Roberts, Charles H. (Lincoln)

    Whitbread, S. Howard

    Macdonald, J. M. (Falkirk Burghs)

    Roberts, G. H. (Norwich)

    White, Sir George (Norfolk)

    Macnamara, Dr. Thomas J.

    Robertson, J. M. (Tyneside)

    White, J. Dundas (Dumbartonshire)

    M'Callum, John M.

    Robinson, S.

    White, Sir Luke (York, E.R.)

    M'Laren, Sir C. B. (Leicester)

    Robson, Sir William Snowdon

    Whitley, John Henry (Halifax)

    Maddison, Frederick

    Roch, Walter F. (Pembroke)

    Williams, W. Llewelyn (Car'th'n)

    Manfield, Harry (Northants)

    Roe, Sir Thomas

    Williamson, A.

    Marks, G. Croydon (Launceston)

    Rogers, F. E. Newman

    Wills, Arthur Walters

    Marnham, F. J.

    Rowlands, J.

    Wilson, Henry J. (York, W.R.)

    Massie, J.

    Runciman, Rt. Hon. Walter

    Wilson, John (Durham, Mid)

    Meehan, Francis E. (Leitrim, N.)

    Russell, Rt. Hon. T. W.

    Wilson, J. H. (Middlesbrough)

    Menzies, Walter

    Rutherford, V. H. (Brentford)

    Wilson, P. W. (St. Pancras, S.)

    Micklem, Nathaniel

    Samuel, Rt. Hon. H. L. (Cleveland)

    Winfrey, R.

    Middlebrook, William

    Scott, A. H. (Ashton-under-Lyne)

    Molteno, Percy Alport

    Seaverns, J. H.

    TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—Mr. Joseph Pease and Mr. Herbert Lewis.

    Money, L. G. Chiozza

    Seddon, J.

    Original Question put, and agreed to.

    And it being after Eleven of the clock, the Chairman left the chair to make his Report to the House.
    Resolution to be reported to-morrow; to sit again to-morrow.

MERCANTILE CORPORATIONS AND COMPANIES (MUNICIPAL FRANCHISE) BILL.
Order for second reading read.
Motion made and Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Further proceeding objected to.
Sir W. HOLLAND: I would appeal to hon. Members to withdraw their objection to this Bill, and allow it to be now read a second time.
Mr. HARMOOD-BANNER: I would also appeal to Members on our side of the House to withdraw objection.
Second reading deferred till to-morrow.

REMISSION OF SURCHARGES (DUBLIN) BILL.
Order for second reading read.
Motion made and Question proposed: "That the Bill be now read a second time."
Agreed to.
Ordered "That the Bill be committed to a Select Committee of five Members, three to be nominated by the House and two by the Committee of Selection:
"That all Petitions against the Bill presented five clear days before the meeting of the Committee be referred to the Committee:
"That the petitioners praying to be heard by themselves, their counsel, or agents, be heard against the Bill, and counsel heard in support of the Bill:
"That the Committee have power to send for persons, papers, and records:
"That three be the quorum."—[Mr. Nannetti.]
The House adjourned at Thirteen minutes after-Eleven of the clock.

  Tidworth Barracks.
  Tidworth Barracks.
  Ludgershall (Military Water Supply).
  Ludgershall (Military Water Supply).
  Gyroscope-Compasses.
  Gyroscope-Compasses.
  Shop Hours Bill (Sub-Postmasters).
  Shop Hours Bill (Sub-Postmasters).
  Births in Prison (England and Wales).
  Births in Prison (England and Wales).
  Portsmouth Harbour (Motor Boats).
  Portsmouth Harbour (Motor Boats).
  Steamship "Sutherland."
  Steamship "Sutherland."
  Steamship "City of London."
  Steamship "City of London."
  Census of Production Act.
  Census of Production Act.
  Durham (County) Poor Law Guardians.
  Durham (County) Poor Law Guardians.
  Treasury Issues.
  Treasury Issues.
  Old Age Pensions Granted (United Kingdom).
  Old Age Pensions Granted (United Kingdom).
  Tithe (Land Tax).
  Tithe (Land Tax).
  Parish Areas (Land Tax).
  Parish Areas (Land Tax).
  Post Office Employés (Superannuation).
  Post Office Employés (Superannuation).
  Revenue from Liquors and Drugs (India).
  Revenue from Liquors and Drugs (India).
  Indian Telegraph Department.
  Indian Telegraph Department.
  Committee of National Defence.
  Committee of National Defence.
  Civil Servants (Political Activities).
  Civil Servants (Political Activities).
  Byres and Milk-houses (Scotland).
  Byres and Milk-houses (Scotland).
  Congested Districts Board (Scotland).
  Congested Districts Board (Scotland).
  Sugar and Cocoa Estates (Trinidad).
  Sugar and Cocoa Estates (Trinidad).
  Crown Colonies and Protectorates (State Servants).
  Crown Colonies and Protectorates (State Servants).
  Steam Trawling (Ireland).
  Steam Trawling (Ireland).
  Science Teaching (Ireland).
  Science Teaching (Ireland).
SOUTH STAFFORDSHIRE WATER BILL. [H.L.]
Report from His Majesty's Attorney-General received, and ordered to lie on the Table.
SOUTH WESTERN AND ISLE OF WIGHT JUNCTION RAILWAY BILL. [H.L.]
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill no parties having appeared in opposition thereto; read, and ordered to lie on the Table: The orders made on March 17 and 30 last discharged, and Bill committed.
LISBURN URBAN DISTRICT COUNCIL BILL. [H.L.]
Report from the Select Committee, That the Committee had not proceeded with the consideration of the Bill no parties having appeared in opposition thereto; read, and ordered to lie on the Table: The orders made on March 2 and 30 last discharged, and Bill committed.
HASTINGS HARBOUR BILL.
The King's consent signified, and Bill reported without amendment.
STOCK CONVERSION AND INVESTMENT TRUST (NORTH EASTERN RAILWAY CONSOLS) BILL. [H.L.]
Reported, with amendments.
WALLASEY TRAMWAYS AND IMPROVEMENTS BILL.
Read 2a and committed: The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
LITTLEHAMPTON GAS BILL.
Read 2a and committed.
THAMES TUNNEL (NORTH AND SOUTH WOOLWICH) BILL.
Read 2a and committed: The Committee to be proposed by the Committee of Selection.
RIO TINTO COMPANY BILL. [H.L.]
Read 2a (according to order) and committed.
WEST KENT ELECTRIC POWER BILL. [H.L.]
Read 2a (according to order), and committed.
INDIAN COUNCILS BILL. [H.L.]
Returned from the Commons agreed to, with amendments: The said amendments to be printed, and to be considered on Monday next. (No. 32.)
JOURNAL COMMITTEE.
Report from, that the One hundred and fortieth Volume of the Journals (8th Edward VII, 1908), with an Index, was ready for delivery; read, and ordered to lie on the Table; and the said Volume ordered to be delivered in the same manner as the preceding Volumes of the Journal have been delivered.
CHILD MURDER (RECORD OF SENTENCE OF DEATH) BILL. [H.L.]
A Bill to enable sentence of death to be recorded without being pronounced in the case of a woman convicted of the murder of her infant child—Was presented by The Lord Alverstone; read 1a; to be printed; and to be read 2a on Tuesday next. (No. 33.)

ARMY (ANNUAL) BILL.
Amendment reported (according to Order).
THE UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE FOR WAR (LORD LUCAS):My Lords, when this Bill was being considered in Committee yesterday I undertook to frame words which would satisfy the point raised by the noble Earl, Lord Camperdown, and to move their insertion to-day in lieu of the Amendment which I had then on the Paper. The Amendment standing in my name to-day will, I hope, meet the noble Earl's point.
Amendment moved—
"In Clause 4, page 3, line 25, to leave out subsection (2) and to insert the following new subsection:

639
'(2) The powers and duties transferred to the Army Council by this section shall as from the commencement of this Act be deemed to be business within the meaning of the Order in Council dated the tenth day of August nineteen hundred and four regulating the distribution of business amongst the members of the Army Council. The Secretary of State may however reserve to himself any part of such business; and
'(3) Nothing in this section shall affect the responsibility of the Secretary of State to His Majesty and to Parliament.'"—(Lord Lucas.)
THE. EARL OF CAMPERDOWN:My Lords, my noble friend was kind enough to draft this Amendment and to show it to me after the House separated yesterday. I readily accepted it, as it seemed to entirely meet the case. I am very much obliged to the noble Lord for acceding to my wishes.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Then Standing Order No. XXXIX considered (according to order), and dispensed with: Bill read 3a, with the Amendments, and passed, and returned to the Commons.

ELECTRIC LIGHTING ACTS (AMENDMENT) BILL. [H.L.]
Order of the day for the House to be put into Committee, read.
Moved, That the House do now resolve itself into Committee.—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEES (THE EARL OF ONSLOW):My Lords, before your Lordships go into Committee on this Bill perhaps I may be allowed to say a word or two. I have been in communication with the noble Lord in charge of the Bill, and a number of the Amendments standing in his name will go a long way to meet the objections entertained to the Bill. But there are some other matters, dealing principally with Clause 4 (Supply of electricity to railways, tramways, and canals partly outside area of supply). On the question whether procedure should be by the Order of the Board of Trade simply or by a Provisional Order confirmed by Parliament, I have not been able to agree with my noble friend; and I shall, therefore, ask your Lordshpis to consider some Amendments at the next stage of the Bill. It may be necessary for me to make some observations to-day on the Amendments to be moved in the course of the proceedings in Committee, and, if so, I shall ask your Lordships to permit me to leave the
640
Chair for that purpose. Lord Avebury has some Amendments to Clause 15, but they only appeared on the Paper this morning. I have been in communication with the Municipal Corporations Association, who speak for the larger boroughs mainly concerned in matters of electric lighting, but I have not yet been able to ascertain whether the proposal of the noble Lord would meet with their approval. Therefore I would ask my noble friend to be good enough to defer his Amendments to Clause 15 till we reach the next stage of the Bill.
LORD AVEBURY:My Lords I will, of course, readily comply with the request of my noble friend. I am sorry I was unable to put the Amendments to Clause 15 on the Paper earlier, but there were various people interested in the matter who had to consider them. In the circumstances, I am quite willing to defer those particular Amendments and to move them on Report.
On Question, Motion agreed to.
House in Committee accordingly.
[The EARL OF ONSLOW in the Chair.]
Clause 1 agreed to.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGHmoved to insert, after Clause 1, the following new clause—
"It shall not be lawful for any undertakers after the passing of this Act except with the consent of the Board of Trade to construct any generating station on any land acquired by them after the thirty-first day of March one thousand nine hundred and nine unless the construction is authorised and the land is specified in a special Act or Provisional Order and the Board of Trade shall not in any case give such consent until notice has been given by advertisement or otherwise as the Board of Trade may direct to owners and lessees of land situate within three hundred yards of the land upon which the generating station is to be constructed and an opportunity has been given to those owners and lessees of stating any objections they may have thereto."
He thought the Amendment conveyed within its own phraseology the object he had in view in placing it on the Paper, and he was hopeful that His Majesty's Government might be able to accept it. Therefore he would not at the present moment do more than simply outline the case on its behalf. An electricity generating station was not altogether a thing of beauty. It was an evil in almost any district; but it was

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possibly one of those things which came within the category of necessary evils, which must be endured where they could not be altogether got rid of. The present position was that when any body of undertakers desired to construct a generating station and to acquire a site compulsorily for the purpose, they specified the site in their Bill or Order, in regard to which any one could appear before the Committee and make such objections as might seem fit. When, however, compulsory powers were not sought, there was a modified procedure, and in that ease also, if the undertakers sought power to regulate their procedure, objection could be taken and parties could appear. But there was a third way of constructing a generating station—namely, on land acquired by agreement, In that case, if the undertakers proceeded to set up the generating station they were, of course, liable to the ordinary law as to nuisance. That, however, was not a very satisfactory position, because the law of nuisance took no account of amenity, and amenity might be a very serious thing in certain localities in which it was proposed to construct a generating station. He instanced the large generating station constructed close to the Greenwich Observatory, and said that if what had taken place there had been fully realised beforehand steps would have been taken to obviate it. There was an instance in the University of Cambridge where a generating station had been erected in close proximity to a college, and other cases could be mentioned where important buildings had been seriously damnified from the amenity point of view by the erection of large generating stations. The Office of Works had been alive to this, and, being able to watch all these Orders, had secured protection where they thought it necessary. The suggestion made in his proposed new clause was that hereafter, when any undertakers proposed to construct a generating station for either electric power or electric lighting, they should be required to get the sanction of the Board of Trade, a body which in a matter of this kind would obviously be regarded, not only as the most fit, but as an impartial, tribunal. The undertakers would have to publish notice and a local inquiry would be held. As at first drafted, his proposed new clause would have applied to land purchased before or after March 31 last, but, on the suggestion of the Board of Trade, it had
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now been confined to land acquired after March 31; and he hoped, in those circumstances, having regard to the extremely reasonable character of the proposal, the Amendment would meet with acceptance.
Amendment moved—
"To insert, after Clause 1, the following new clause:
'It shall not be lawful for any undertakers after the passing of this Act except with the consent of the Board of Trade to construct any generating station on any land acquired by them after the thirty-first day of March one thousand nine hundred and nine unless the construction is authorised and the land is specified in a special Act or Provisional Order and the Board of Trade shall not in any case give such consent until notice has been given by advertisement or otherwise as the Board of Trade may direct to owners and lessees of land situate within three hundred yards of the land upon which the generating station is to be constructed and an opportunity has been given to those owners and lessees of stating any objections they may have thereto.'"—(Lord Balfour of Burleigh.)
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid this was one of the matters on which the Board of Trade had been in consultation with the noble Earl the Chairman of Committees. The Board were much impressed by the reasonableness of the proposal, and in the shape in which the clause was now proposed they accepted it.
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 2:
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLmoved to amend this clause, which provided that—
"For the purpose of enabling electricity to be brought into an area of supply from a generating station situated outside that area or for enabling a supply of electricity in bulk to be given the Board of Trade may by Provisional Order apply to any roads railways or tramways situated outside that area the provisions of the Electric Lighting Acts which authorise or enable the Board of Trade to authorise the breaking up of any road railway or tramway so far as those provisions do not already so apply,"
by inserting, after the words "generating station," the words " belonging to any undertakers." The object of this Amendment was, he said, to make it clear that the facilities were to be given only to authorised undertakers as they were understood in the sense of the Electric Lighting Acts.
Amendment moved—
"In page 2, line 2, after the word 'station,' to insert the words 'belonging to any undertakers.'"—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLmoved to delete the words "or for enabling a supply of electricity in bulk to be given." These words were to be omitted because the object which they were to effect could be better secured by the words proposed to be inserted by the next Amendment standing in his name.
Amendment moved—
"In page 2, lines 3 and 4, to leave out the words 'or for enabling a supply of electricity in bulk to be given.'"—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHmoved to amend the proviso—
"Provided that a Provisional Order authorising the breaking up of roads outside the area of supply shall not be granted by the Board of Trade except with the consent of the local authority in whose district the road is situate unless the Board of Trade in any case in which the consent of any such local authority is refused are of opinion that having regard to all the circumstances of the case such consent ought to be dispensed with and in I that case they shall make a special report to Parliament stating the grounds on which they have dispensed with the consent,"
by omitting the word "local" where it first appeared. His object in moving this Amendment was to clear up a doubt, but the real Amendment was the next one on the Paper—namely, to leave out the words "in whose district the road is situate" and to insert the words "which is liable for the maintenance of the road." The point with regard to the word "local" was that there was no definition in the Bill of a local authority, and the definition contained in the Electric Lighting Act of 1882 did not include a county council. The object of his Amendment was to embrace any local authority. But if the noble Lord was of opinion that the words "local authority" included a county council, he would not press the Amendment.
Amendment moved—
"In page 2, line 12, to leave out the word 'local.'"—(Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.)
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid that though the Amendment appeared at first sight a very simple one, it really embodied an important principle and one to which the Board of Trade could not consent. The object of the clause was to allow a supply of electricity to be brought
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into a district from a generating station situated outside that district, and for that purpose the clause provided that the roads might be broken up. In the part of the clause which the noble Lord wished to amend, it was laid down that the local authority through whose territory the main was to pass should have a qualified veto—that was to say, they might oppose the laying of the main, but their refusal might be appealed against to the Board of Trade. What the noble Lord asked by this Amendment—
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHsaid that the noble Lord was dealing rather with his (Lord Clifford's) second Amendment, to which he had only referred but which he had not yet explained or moved.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLreplied that he understood that the noble Lord had dealt with the two Amendments together. At any rate, the Board of Trade objected equally to both Amendments.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHsaid he would raise no objection, if the the noble Lord in charge of the Bill thought it advisable, to leaving in the words "in whose district the road is situate," but adding the words "or which is liable for the maintenance of the road." The question divided itself into two. First, there was the authority in whose district the work might be going on, and, second, the authority on whom fell the duty of keeping the particular road in order; and it seemed to him only reasonable to provide that both authorities should be given the qualified veto to which the noble Lord had referred. The point in regard to the words "local authority" was only as to whether or not they included a county council.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid that in regard to the latter point there could be no doubt that, in the meaning of the Electric Lighting Acts, a county council was not a local authority for the purposes of electric lighting. What the noble Lord's two Amendments, read together, would do would be to substitute the county council for the local authority within the meaning of the Electric Lighting Acts—that was to say, that if the road to be broken up was a county road the council would then become the authority to be allowed to oppose the proposal, instead of the urban

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council, or district council, or municipality as the case might be. The reason for giving the veto to these local authorities was that by the Electric Lighting Acts they were given priority in the matter of the supply of electric light within their districts, and also when the time came for the purchase of electric light undertakings they were the authorities which had the right of purchase. County councils did not exercise any of those powers, and therefore from that point of view there was no reason for making the county council the authority which should be allowed to object under this clause. County councils were fully protected by Section 14 of the Schedule to the Electric Lighting (Clauses) Act, 1899. That section provided that undertakers desiring to execute works in main roads must serve a notice, together with a plan, of the proposed works upon the county council, and the county council had power to approve the plans with such Amendments as they might think fit, or to disapprove of them, subject always to an appeal to the Board of Trade. The reason the Board of Trade objected to the noble Lord's Amendments was that as regards roads the county council were fully safeguarded by the section to which he had referred, and that as regards electric lighting they had no interest in the matter.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHsaid that, in the circumstances, he would not press the Amendment to omit the word "local," and would not move his second Amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 2, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 3:
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLmoved to add at the end of subsection (1), which ran—
"The Board of Trade unless they are of opinion that by reason of the character or magnitude of the proposed undertaking the matter ought to be dealt with by private Bill may by Provisional Order—

authorise any local authority or company to supply electricity in bulk;

provide for any supply so authorised being compulsory; and

make such other provisions as appear to them necessary for adapting the Electric Lighting
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Acts to any case where a local authority or company are authorised to supply electricity in bulk,"

the words—
"including the application to roads railways and tramways along the route along which lines are authorised to be laid for the purpose of giving the supply in bulk of the provisions of those Acts which authorise or enable the Board of Trade to authorise the breaking up of any road railway or tramway."
This addition was to effect the purpose intended to be achieved by the words "or for enabling a supply of electricity in bulk to be given," which words the Committee had omitted by the adoption of his last Amendment. The object of Clause 3 was to allow a local authority to supply in bulk to another local authority or electric light undertaking passing through the territory of an intervening district, and the Amendment was moved in consequence of a suggestion made by the Lord Chairman that this was a more easily understandable and more regular way of effecting that purpose than by the words which originally appeared in the clause.
Amendment moved—
"In page 2, line 30, after the word 'bulk' to insert the words 'including the application to roads railways and tramways along the route along which lines are authorised to be laid for the purpose of giving the supply in bulk of the provisions of those Acts which authorise or enable the Board of Trade to authorise the breaking up of any road railway or tramway.'"—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Drafting Amendment agreed to.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLmoved to amend subsection (3)—
"(3) The Board of Trade may if they think fit by order authorise any undertakers to supply electricity in bulk to any other undertakers upon such terms and subject to such conditions as may be specified in the order if the supply can be given without breaking up any streets except such as the undertakers giving and the undertakers receiving the supply are authorised to break up,"
by adding, at the end of the subsection, the words—
"but the Board of Trade shall not in any case make such an order until notice of the intention to make the order has been given by advertisement or otherwise as the Board of Trade may direct and an opportunity has been given to any person who appears to the Board to be affected of stating any objections he may have thereto."

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He explained that this Amendment was also proposed in consequence of a suggestion made by the Lord Chairman. The order provided for in the subsection did not have to come before Parliament. It was a simple order of the Board of Trade, and the Amendment provided machinery by which those who were interested might be given an opportunity of stating objections before the order was made.
Amendment moved—
"In page 3, line 11, after the word 'up' to insert the words 'but the Board of Trade shall not in any case make such an order until notice of the intention to make the order has been given by advertisement or otherwise as the Board of Trade may direct and an opportunity has been given to any person who appears to the Board to be affected of stating any objections he may have thereto.'"—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 3, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 4:
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid the Amendment standing in his name to this clause was exactly similar to the last Amendment to which the Committee had agreed.
Amendment moved—
"In page 3, line 18, after the word 'canal' to insert the words 'but the Board of Trade shall not in any case give any such consent until notice of the application for the consent has been given by advertisement or otherwise in such manner as the Board of Trade may direct and an opportunity has been given to any person who appears to the Board to be affected of stating any objections he may have thereto.'"—(Lord Hamilton of Dalzell.)
On Question, Amendment agreed to.
Clause 4, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 5:
Drafting Amendments agreed to.

Clause 5, as amended, agreed to.
Clauses 6 to 11 agreed to.
Clause 12:
LORD AVEBURYexpressed very great doubt as to this clause, which seemed to him to constitute an additional interference with private enterprise over and above
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anything that had been done hitherto. The clause provided that—
"If an auditor appointed by the Board of Trade to audit the accounts of any undertakers who are not a local authority reports to the Board that the undertakers have declined or neglected to comply with any of his recommendations or requirements the Board may if they think fit after giving the undertakers an opportunity of being heard make an order directing the undertakers to comply with such recommendations and requirements with or without modification as may be specified in the order subject to an appeal to the Railway and Canal Commissioners or any two of them who shall finally decide the matter and confirm annul or amend the order as they may think fit."
Surely such a provision ought to apply equally to local authorities, who should be placed on the same footing as companies. He therefore moved to insert a new subsection to make the section applicable in the case of any auditor or auditors appointed under the provisions of the Public Health Act, 1875, or the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882, or by the Local Government Board, to audit the accounts of any undertakers who were a local authority. There was a strong impression out of doors that local authorities did not make proper provision for depreciation and reserve, and the Amendment would make it possible for their auditors to report to the Board where the authority declined or neglected to comply with their recommendations or requirements. At present they had no such power, and the result was that reports were sometimes submitted which were quite fictitious.
Amendment moved—
"In page 7, line 12, after the word 'fit' to insert the following new subsection:
'(2) This section also apply in the case of any auditor or auditors appointed under the provisions of the Public Health Act 1875 or the Municipal Corporations Act 1882 or by the Local Government Board to audit the accounts of any undertakers who are a local authority and where the undertakers being a local authority have declined or neglected to comply with any of his or their recommendations or requirements and for such purpose this section shall have effect as if the Local Government Board was substituted for the Board of Trade.'"—(Lord Avebury.)
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid the Amendment was one which the Board of Trade could not accept. The audit of the electric light undertakings of local authorities was not in the hands of the Board of Trade, but, in the case of the majority of those bodies, in the hands of the Local Government Board auditors, and in the case of municipal boroughs the

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audit was carried out by auditors elected by the municipality. The change which the noble Lord proposed might or might not be a good one, but it was rather a strong order to alter the whole system of auditing the accounts of municipal bodies, certainly as regards the supply of electricity, by a clause in a Bill of this kind. It was not for him to say whether the audit of all municipal authorities was as effective as might be desired. He could conceive that that was a matter which it might be worth while to inquire into. Indeed, it had been gone into very fully in the course of the inquiry into municipal trading generally. He thought the House would see that the change proposed was too drastic a change to introduce in this Bill.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYasked whether the Committee were to understand the noble Lord to say, on behalf of the Government, that the audit was effectively carried out already by other Government Departments.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLreplied that the audit was carried out in the case of most local authorities by the Local Government Board auditors. He had no reason to think that that duty was not most efficiently done; he had every reason to suppose that it was. But he could not speak from personal knowledge of the way in which the elected auditors of municipalities carried out their work, because it was really not a matter into which he had had an opportunity of inquiring.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYsaid that the impression he gathered from the statement of the noble Lord was that the audit was far from being satisfactory. Unless the audit was effective it was not only no good but a positive evil, because it misled the public as to the financial soundness or otherwise of the undertakings. He hoped that a more complete answer would be given on this subject at a later stage, for the question was an important one.
LORD AVEBURYurged that the Government apparently proposed to introduce a drastic amendment of the law which was to apply to the companies only. The amendment, however, was just as necessary in the case of local authorities, and certainly the Joint Committee on Muni-
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cipal Trading were not at all satisfied with the audit. The general impression outside was that in many cases the audit was not satisfactory, and the whole object of his Amendment was to provide that in respect of the local authorities the same principle should be applied.
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL AND SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES (THE EARL OF CREWE)My Lords, as it happened that I presided over the Joint Committee to which the noble Lord referred, I may, perhaps, say one word. It is quite true that, as regards the general question of municipal audit, the Committee did make certain recommendations, but neither the Government of noble Lords opposite, which was then in power, nor the Governments which have existed since have seen their way to alter the whole system of municipal audit, although I, for one, think that in some respects it might be improved. But the point made by my noble friend who represents the Board of Trade seems to me a perfectly sound one—namely, that, whatever may be our opinion on that point, the consideration of this clause of this particular Bill cannot be made the occasion for a complete alteration of the system of municipal audit. I hope, therefore, that the Amendment will not be pressed.
THE CHAIRMAN OF COMMITTEESindicated that he had in consultation agreed to certain words, which might be inserted at a later stage of the Bill, to confine the recommendations of the auditors of companies' accounts to such matters as would affect either the value of the undertaking which might hereafter be purchased by a local authority, or which might affect the sliding scale on which dividends were reckoned and the price at which electricity was to be sold. If the clause was so limited it would not apply to municipalities at all. He hoped the noble Lord would not press his Amendment at this stage. If, at a subsequent stage, words were introduced which would confine the recommendations of auditors in the manner indicated, he thought their Lord ships could safely allow the clause to pass
LORD AVEBURYagain insisted that it was most desirable to have a good audit in both classes of undertakings; but he would

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accept the suggestion to withdraw the Amendment at the present
stage.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid that the Government were as anxious as the noble Lord to secure an efficient audit, and he would be glad to consult with him before the next stage of the Bill was taken.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 12 agreed to.
Clauses 13 and 14 agreed to.
Clause 15:
LORD AVEBURYsaid that it was not his intention, at the present stage to move the Amendments standing in his name to this clause.
Clause 15 agreed to.
Clauses 16 to 18 agreed to.
Clause 19:
Drafting Amendment agreed to.
Clause 19, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 20:
Drafting Amendments agreed to.
Clause 20, as amended, agreed to.
Clause 21:
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGHmoved to amend Subsection (1)—
"Nothing in any Provisional Order whether confirmed before or after the passing of this Act shall in any way limit or affect the powers of any county council to re-build alter widen or repair the structure of any bridge upon which any work authorised by the Order may be constructed or impose upon the county council any liability which was not by law imposed upon them prior to the commencement of the Order,"
by inserting, after the words "affect the powers of any county council," the words "or railway company." The proposal in the Amendment seemed to him an eminently fair one, having regard to the fact that the Government were altering the present state of the law in favour of county councils. He argued that in a case in which a railway company owned a
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portion of a road and was for all practical purposes in the position of a county council the company ought to have the same facilities and privileges as the county council. If a road had to be widened and the electric plant removed the expense was now placed on the body that wanted to make the alteration; ii the Bill passed in its present form the onus of paying the expense of removal would in all cases where roads were vested in county councils be put on the undertakers who were the owners of the plant. He thought that was not unreasonable, because they were, so to speak, intruders on the property. But if that principle was fair in the case of a county council the same consideration applied with great force to railway companies. Take the case of a bridge carrying a railway. That bridge was, of course, the private property of the railway company, but, in spite of that, if he read the clause rightly, it would still be obligatory on the railway company, if they desired to widen the bridge and the bridge carried an electrical plant, to pay the expense of altering the position of the electrical plant. That seemed to him very unfair, and he submitted that if a relaxation was to be given to the county council the railway companies as owners of a bridge were in a stronger position.
Amendment moved—
"In page 10, line 9, after the word 'council,' to insert the words 'or railway company.'"—(Lord Balfour of Burleigh.)
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLpointed out that when a railway interfered with a road the obligation of the railway company was to restore that road by making a bridge so as not to interfere with its free use by the public. The same principle applied to those who used the road in accordance with their statutory powers, such as electric light undertakers. It was obviously wrong that if a railway company found it necessary to make an alteration in a bridge any expense should be put upon the electric light undertaking.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGHcould see no reason why a railway company should be put in a different position from that of a county council. There was no difference in the physical conditions. A county council wishing to make a change for public purposes was to have the privilege of compelling the electric light undertakers

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to pay the expense of moving their plant while the alteration was made. If a railway company, it might be for public purposes too, desired to make a change, why should they be placed in a worse position? The noble Lord had not said a word about the case where the railway was carried over a bridge and the electric mains ran along the bridge which carried the railway.
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLconfessed that he did not quite understand the last point. When a county council made a bridge they constructed it over some natural obstacle, probably over a river, and therefore they were not in the same position as a railway company, who were obliged by Act of Parliament to carry the bridge over an obstruction which they themselves had created. The difference appeared to him to be a perfectly obvious one.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGHsaid the railway company and their bridge were there first, and the electric light undertakers were, so to speak, intruders on existing property. It would, therefore, be fair to put railway companies in the same position as county councils. Suppose a railway line crossed a public road and the bridge afforded a convenient means of carrying an electric light company's mains from one side of the road to the other. The railway company was compelled to allow that to be done; but if they had to make a quadruple line instead of a double line, how could it be fair that they should be compelled to bear the expense of altering the electric mains? The noble Lord would find that the Board of Trade were perfectly familiar with the point. From previous communications and some knowledge of the subject he had anticipated that the answer of the Board of Trade to his Amendment would have been that they did not, as a matter of practice, give such powers in these cases. If that had been the noble Lord's answer he was prepared with this reply, that that was a mere matter of administrative convenience and that there was no obligation on the Board of Trade to maintain that policy. It might be changed at any moment, and if it were changed it would be a serious grievance and a great expense to railway companies placed in that position. If it would be more convenient he was perfectly willing to postpone his Amendment, but he should do so in the
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earnest hope that the Board of Trade would consider the point in a judicial spirit.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHmoved an Amendment to extend the principle of the clause to diverting, widening, raising, draining, or improving any road. He said that the late President of the Board of Trade, in replying to a deputation from the County Councils Association on this subject, had expressed sympathy with county councils, and had admitted that there was a great deal to be said for their contention in the matter of bridges, since in most cases electric light undertakings were private concerns run for profit. The right hon. gentleman, therefore, agreed that it was rather hard on county councils that they should be put to further expense in regard to electric mains when they were obliged, in the public interest, and in the public interest alone, to make alterations in their bridges. But he (Lord Clifford) was unable to see any difference between a bridge and an ordinary road. It was for the public use alone that a county council were obliged to alter or widen a road, and therefore they ought not to be put to any additional expense in respect of electric lighting mains when they did so.
Amendment moved—
"In page 10, line 10, after the word 'bridge' to insert the words 'or to divert widen raise drain or improve any road repairable by them.'"—(Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.)
LORD HAMILTON OF DALZELLsaid the Bill provided that where electric mains had been laid in a road which crossed a bridge, and where it was found necessary to alter or rebuild that bridge, the local authority responsible for the bridge should not be put to any expense on account of the existence of the electric mains. What the noble Lord now asked the Committee to do was to apply the same principle to all alterations of roads. He admitted that it was not easy to say what difference there was between roads and bridges in this connection. He supposed it might be argued that the hospitality which the undertakers received in a road was not quite of the same value as that accorded them on a bridge, and that the expenditure of the local authority on paving the road was not to the advantage of the undertakers but rather to their disadvantage, because they had to dig through and replace an expensive

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surface, whereas in the case of a bridge they actually reaped the benefit of the money which had been spent because they found the chasm, or whatever it might be, already bridged for them. But that was not the point he wished to press. He would confess at once that what the Board of Trade had done was in the nature of a compromise. As their Lordships knew, a compromise was very useful, but it was not always possible to defend it on strictly logical grounds. What the local authorities said, and said very rightly, was that it was hard that when they had to alter a road in the public interest they should be put to additional expense in consequence of electric mains. But the undertakers also held that it was very hard that they should be put to expense in carrying out their statutory obligations to supply electric light because the local authority could not make up their minds as to the best place for the road. The arrangement which had been arrived at was a compromise. He also pointed out that if the Amendment were accepted there would be one law for county roads and another for non-county roads.
THE MARQUESS OF SALISBURYsaid that when a matter was stated to be one of compromise it was generally supposed that that concluded the discussion. He confessed that he rather pitied the noble Lord for having to defend a compromise with so little material. Here were two cases which seemed to be exactly parallel, the case of the road and the case of the bridge. Both belonged to the public authority and existed for the benefit of the public, and the undeniable force of the argument in the case of the bridge seemed to him to apply equally to the road. It was a distinct hardship on local authorities that the Government did not give way on this point. He did not believe that the expense which would be thrown upon electric light companies would be a very serious matter. It was not as if local authorities were in the habit of capriciously diverting roads. The noble Lord in charge of the Bill had spoken of a county council not being able to make up its mind where the road should be. There was no question of that kind. The diversion of a road was a serious matter, involving a great deal of inconvenience to many persons. It was never undertaken except after careful consideration and with the greatest reluctance, and if in those
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very rare cases the electric light company had to share the inconvenience and expense to which the public itself was put, that did not seem to him to be a very great hardship on the company. He did not know how far his noble friend intended to press the Amendment, but on the arguments submitted to their Lordships the Government did not appear to have much of a case.
LORD JOICEYthought the noble Marquess's argument tended rather to show that it was unwise on the part of the Government to admit bridges. Alterations to roads had been spoken of, but the words in the Amendment were "divert widen raise drain or improve" any road. If a charge of the kind in question were placed upon electric light companies, who, after all, were serving the public and in many cases supplying electricity at fixed figures, it would completely alter the whole of their arrangements. He hoped the Amendment would not be pressed, as it would undoubtedly place a very heavy increased expenditure upon these companies.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHannounced that in the circumstances he desired to press the Amendment to a division. The noble Lord who spoke for the Board of Trade rather suggested that electric light companies obtained no advantage at all from taking their cables along the high road, and seemed to think they were under a disadvantage in willingly selecting a macadamised road; but it was obvious that they gained great advantage thereby. Moreover, it was much cheaper than obtaining compulsory powers for taking the plant over the fields of adjoining landowners. For this reason he failed to see why any difference should be made between a bridge and a main road. The only argument that at all impressed him was the argument that the matter was a small one, and that local authorities seldom diverted, widened, or altered their roads. It was, therefore, contended that it would only be in a few cases that his Amendment would be applicable; but he regarded that as equally an argument for passing the Amendment as for rejecting it. He would, therefore, divide the Committee on the Amendment.
On Question, whether the words proposed should be inserted?—
Their Lordships divided:—Contents, 33; Not-contents, 21.

CONTENTS.

Bath, M.

Cross, V.

Ellenborough, L.

Salisbury, M.

Falkland, V.

Hindlip, L.

Goschen, V.

Kilmarnock, L. (E. Erroll.)

Camperdown, E. [Teller.]

Lawrence, L.

Cathcart, E.

Abinger, L.

Ludlow, L.

Cawdor, E.

Balfour, L.

Montagu of Beaulieu, L.

Denbigh, E.

Barrymore, L.

Ravensworth, L.

Morley, E.

Blythswood, L.

Saltoun, L.

Onslow, E.

Brodrick, L. (V. Midleton.)

Sanderson, L.

Waldegrave, E.

Clifford of Chudleigh, L. [Teller.]

Sinclair, L.

Clinton, L.

Wemyss, L. (E. Wemyss.)

Churchill, V.

Colchester, L.

Zouche of Haryngworth, L.

NOT-CONTENTS.

Loreburn, L. (L. Chancellor.)

Allendale, L.

Joicey, L.

Wolverhampton, V. (L. President.)

Brassey, L.

Lochee, L.

Colebrooke, L. [Teller.]

Lucas, L.

Crewe, E. (L. Privy Seal.)

Fitzmaurice, L.

Mac Donnell, L.

Glantawe, L.

Marchamley, L.

Beauchamp, E. (L. Steward.)

Hamilton of Dalzell, L.

Pentland, L.

Chichester, E.

Haversham, L.

Pirrie, L.

Herschell, L. [Teller.]

Saye and Sele, L.

Amendment agreed to accordingly.
Consequential Amendment agreed to.
LORD CLIFFORD OF CHUDLEIGHmoved to further amend Clause 21 by providing that the company should to the reasonable satisfaction of the county council keep the portion of all roads repairable by the county council which should be broken up by the company for the purpose of constructing, laying, or repairing any works authorised by the Order in good repair for twelve months after replacing and making good the same, and should compensate the county council for the extra repair rendered necessary by concentration of traffic on any portion of the road not broken up by them. He said that very often these works occupied a considerable time, and the whole, perhaps, of a very heavy traffic was meanwhile concentrated on the half or smaller portion of the road not broken up. The result was that that section of the road came to be repaired very much sooner than would otherwise be the case. The undertakers, on the conclusion of their work, reinstated the portion of the road which they had taken up, but did nothing to repair the damage caused to the other portion which they had not touched but upon which there had been a great concentration of traffic. He submitted that it was perfectly reasonable that the undertakers should be liable for any damage which could be clearly proved to be due to this concentration of traffic.
Amendment moved—
"In page 10, line 32, after the word 'out' to insert the words 'The company shall to the reason-
658
able satisfaction of the county council keep the portion of all roads repairable by the county council which shall be broken up by the company for the purpose of constructing laying or repairing any works authorised by the Order in good repair for twelve months after replacing and making good the same, and shall compensate the county council for the extra repair rendered necessary by concentration of traffic on any portion of the road not broken up by them.'"—(Lord Clifford of Chudleigh.)
LORD HAMILTON of DALZELLadmitted that there was a good deal to be said with reference to concentration of traffic in the case of the laying of tramways, which meant, as many of their Lordships must have noticed in motoring in and out of London, the blocking up of roads for a considerable time. But the laying of electric light cables was a very different thing. It only necessitated a trench some twelve inches wide, and the extremely hard nature of the surface of the road made the undertakers unwilling to break up more of it than could be helped. He did not think that the concentration of traffic caused by a trench twelve inches wide was such as to render it necessary to insert a provision dealing with it in an Act of Parliament. He therefore resisted the Amendment as unnecessary.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 21, as amended, agreed to.
Remaining Clauses and Schedules agreed to.
Standing Committee negatived: The Report of Amendments to be received on Thursday, May 6 next, and Bill to be printed as amended. (No. 34.)

DISCLOSURE OF ADMIRALTY DOCUMENTS.
THE EARL OF DENBIGH:My Lords, I rise to ask His Majesty's Government, with reference to a letter written by Captain Bacon, R.N., to the First Sea Lord in April, 1906, commenting on what he describes as "the Service agitation headed by Lord Charles Beresford and Admiral Lambton," for what purpose the letter was published and circulated; whether the Board of Admiralty as a whole consider that the letter in question with the sentiments expressed in it was a proper one to have been written by a junior captain to a First Sea Lord; whether they approve of its printing; and whether they approve of its publication and circulation.
THE EARL OF CREWE:My Lords, I am not sorry that the noble Earl has put this series of Questions, because the matter, I understand, is one which has aroused some little interest in the Press and has led to Questions in another place. I understand that the letter referred to was a private letter written by Captain Bacon to the First Sea Lord, he having been previously at the Admiralty in a subordinate position closely associated with the First Sea Lord. The letter was not circulated or published. It is true that it was printed, but, as noble Lords opposite who are acquainted with the working of public Departments know, it is by no means an uncommon thing for a purely private letter to be printed for the convenience of the head of the Department. In this case the letter was printed for the convenience of Lord Tweedmouth, who was at that time First Lord of the Admiralty, and the printing was simply carried out for the purpose of convenience of record. That is a frequent practice. The noble Viscount opposite, Lord Midleton, who has been Secretary of State for India, knows that I am right in saying that practically every private communication received from India is printed. Therefore to assume, as the noble Earl, or those who have advised him, seem to assume, that the printing of a document of this kind implies in any sense publication is to be entirely mistaken as to the facts of the case.
The noble Earlthen asks whether the Board of Admiralty as a whole consider that the letter in question with the sentiments expressed in it was a proper one to have been written by a junior captain to a First Sea Lord. As a rule I strongly deprecate questions as to the opinions of particular members of the Board of Admiralty, or of the Army Council, or of any other kindred body. It is a custom—I think a very unfortunate custom—which has grown up of late years to attempt to go behind the opinion expressed by the political head of a Department and endeavour to discover what his permanent advisers think of a particular question. In this case I have no quarrel with the noble Earl for asking the question, because it is, of course, a personal matter, and one affecting the honour of individuals, and consequently it is relevant to ask what the opinion of the members of the Board may be. I am able to say that all the members of the Board of Admiralty, without exception, consider that the letter was a perfectly proper one to have been written by Captain Bacon to the First Sea Lord.
Then the noble Earl asks whether they approve of its publication and circulation. In one sense, as I have pointed out, the letter has not been either circulated or published; but in another sense, I am sorry to say, it has been published, or, at any rate, parts of it have been published, and it can only have been published through a flagrant breach of confidence on the part of some person; and, so far as that kind of publication is concerned, I am quite certain that not only the Board of Admiralty, but also everybody else, will strongly disapprove of the action which has been taken.
LORD BALFOUR OF BURLEIGH:Would it be indiscreet to ask whether any steps can be taken to find out who is responsible for the circulation of the letter?
THE EARL OF CREWE:I will inquire.
House adjourned at five minutes before Six o'clock, till tomorrow, a quarter past Four o'clock.