§ Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if at the present time officers at Parkhurst 844W and Camp Hill Prisons, in the Isle of Wight, are on duty inside the prison walls for the following periods per week: Men on early-turn duty, 65½ hours per week; men on late-turn duty, 62 hours per week; and men on night duty, 78 hours 35 minutes per week; if in any other branch of the Civil Service employés work so many hours; and whether he proposes to take any action in the matter?
§ Mr. McKENNAThe hours for an officer on active day duty work out to an average of sixty-three a week; on night duty he has fifty-eight and a half hours. The hours and conditions of duty for a convict prison officer cannot rightly be compared with those of other members of the Civil Service, and when regard is had to all the circumstances I do not think they can be regarded as excessive.
§ Mr. DOUGLAS HALLasked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if His Majesty's Prison Commissioners received and acknowledged a petition, dated 4th November, 1913, from the warders of Parkhurst Prison on behalf of the warders at Parkhurst, Camp Hill, Portland, and Dartmouth Prisons, and acknowledged the same, informing the petitioners that the Secretary of State would duly consider the same; and, if not, when an answer may be expected?
§ Mr. McKENNAI regret that I cannot at present add anything to the answer which I gave to the hon. Member for Tavistock on the 15th of June.