§ Mr. SNOWDENasked the Minister of Munitions whether his attention has been called to a statement made by Sir William Clegg at the Sheffield Munitions Court recently that one of his gardeners, who had never seen a shell and had lived in a village all his life, went straight away and got an appointment as a shell inspector; and if he will state what are the grounds for appointing inspectors in this way?
§ Dr. ADDISONThere seems to be a good deal of misunderstanding regarding the denominations of "inspector" and "examiner," it would perhaps be well if a fairly full explanation was given. The staff of the Inspection Department is roughly divided into inspectors and assistant-inspectors in the superior grades and four classes of examiners in the subordinate ones. The subordinate grades might be again sub-divided into upper and lower subordinate, the examiners 1st and 2nd class being in the former, and the 3rd and 4th class and labourers being in the latter grade. Inspectors are made from assistant-inspectors after qualified and good service. Assistant-inspectors are all (with very few exceptions for special work) engineers with good and long experience, and are only appointed after being seen personally, their qualifications very fully considered and their references carefully taken up. The upper subordinates, or 1st and 2nd class examiners, are all skilled mechanics, who are interviewed and their qualification and references looked into. These men pass through a practical test before being engaged; if a man cannot pass the test he is not engaged in either of these two classes. The lower subordinates, or 3rd or 4th class examiners, are all engaged from the Labour Exchanges, and unless they show some knowledge of mechanics' work are started as labourers at 31s. per week of forty-eight hours. This labour may be taken as unskilled when started. After having received some training they are examined, and if considered suitable are turned into 4th class examiners at 34s. per week, and eventually, after further training, if found suitable become 3rd class examiners at 38s. per week. A large number of 4th class examiners are women. From this it will be seen that even though a man be a gardener or anything else there is no good reason why, after training, he should not do exceed-326W ingly useful and good work, much of which is practically repetition work, more especially when carefully supervised.