§ Lieut.-Colonel POWNALLasked the Postmaster-General whether the clerks employed in sub-post offices in the Black-heath area are paid as little as £2 for a week of fifty-four hours; what is the wage paid to established Post Office servants for a week of forty-eight hours in the same district; and whether he will explain the reason for this difference in remuneration and conditions?
§ Mr. ILLINGWORTHAs I stated in answer to the hon. Member for Silvertown (Mr. J. Jones) yesterday, assistants at scale payment sub-post offices are engaged and paid by the sub-postmaster, and the Post Office does not undertake more than a general responsibility for ensuring that the conditions of service are not inferior to those commonly in force in shops in the same district. I am afraid it would be impossible to abolish the scale payment sub-office system, which has been confirmed by successive Parliamentary Committees, without a very serious curtailment of the facilities afforded to the public for the transaction of post office business. An established counter clerk and telegraphist in Blackheath receives less than £2 a week, including war bonus, at the commencement of her service. The maximum of the scale, reached after some seventeen years' service, is £3 a week, plus 23s. a week war bonus.