Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 6 Jul 1955

Vol. 152 No. 2

Committee on Finance. - Vote 54—Posts and Telegraphs.

Minister for Posts and Telegraphs (Mr. Keyes)

I move:—

That a sum not exceeding £4,912,000 be granted 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, 1956, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs.

The net Estimate for 1955-56 amounts to £7,707,000, being a gross total of £8,159,876 less Appropriations-in-Aid of £452,876. The net provision represents an increase of £139,000 on that for 1954-55. This figure is not that shown in the published Volume of Estimates (page 297) but there is a simple explanation of the difference. Because of the early date by which the Estimates Volume had to be circulated this year it was not possible to show, as is the custom, the effect of the Post Office Supplementary Estimate approved by the Dáil on the 30th March, 1955. This Supplementary Estimate was for £228,000, and this amount should be deducted from the increase of £367,000 shown in the Estimates Volume to get the net increase of the 1955-56 Estimate over the previous year's figure. In making comparisons between sub-heads of the Estimate, account has been taken of the provision made by the Supplementary Estimate.

The more substantial variations— those of £10,000 or more—occur on the following sub-heads:—In sub-heads A (1), A (2), A (3) and A (4)—Salaries, Wages and Allowances—the increase, £154,206, is due to the grant of higher wage rates to postmen, an additional weekly pay-day falling within this year and normal incremental increases. In sub-head G (1)—Stores (other than Engineering Materials)—the decrease, £31,000, is attributable to greater use of emergency reserve stores and to a reduction in the number of departmental motor vans due for replacement.

In sub-head G (3)—Manufacture of Stamps, etc.—the decrease, £19,500, is due to an improvement in the stock position of stores covered by this sub-head, and in sub-head I (1)—Salaries, Wages and Allowances (Engineering) the decrease, £132,000, is due to a larger amount of the gross provision being chargeable to telephone capital than last year, offset by normal incremental increases.

In sub-head K — Engineering Materials—the decrease, £42,000, is due to greater use of emergency reserve stores. In sub-head L (2)— Contract Work—the increase, £17,000, is due to greater provision for contract work on telegraph construction, and in sub-head M—Telephone Capital Repayments—there is an increase of £70,228.

Funds for the development of the telephone system are provided under the authority of the Telephone Capital Acts (1924 to 1951) which authorise the Minister for Finance to issue sums out of the Central Fund for this purpose. Repayment of these funds is made by means of terminable annuities extending over a period not exceeding 25 years. In consultation with the Minister for Finance provision is made each year under sub-head M for the repayment of the instalments of principal and interest on the annuities created. The increased provision in the sub-head is an indication of the continuing expansion of the telephone system.

In sub-head N (1)—Superannuation Allowances, etc.—the increase, £35,200, is mainly due to (1) higher pensions arising from salary and wage awards, and (2) allowances under the new Superannuation Act, 1954 (No. 14 of 1954). In sub-head O (2)—Civil Aviation and Meteorological Wireless Services—the higher provision, £35,800, is due to the installation of additional equipment to meet international requirements.

Mail services worked satisfactorily during the year. There was some dislocation of rail services, as a result of the floods in December, 1954, but alternative arrangements were made for transport of mails which reduced delay to correspondence to the minimum.

Letter traffic, especially printed paper post, showed an increase during the year, but there was a decrease in parcel traffic, notably to Britain, due probably to the cessation of food rationing there. The raising of the weight limit for parcels in both the inland and foreign post services from 11 lb. to 15 lb. in April, 1954, did not appreciably affect the overall volume of parcel traffic, but the fact that 12 per cent. of foreign parcels now handled come within the extended weight bracket indicates that the additional facility provided for exporting and importing porting goods by post is appreciated. Proposals are under consideration for raising the weight limit in the foreign parcel post service to 22 lb., the limit generally obtaining internationally, and it is expected that it will be found possible to introduce this extension which should prove of great benefit to concerns engaged in the export trade.

Letter traffic last Christmas attained record proportions. Despite widespread publicity aimed at inducing the public to post early, last minute postings were very heavy and this, coupled with the increase in traffic, led to considerable difficulty, especially in Dublin, in effecting delivery before Christmas. Nevertheless, mail posted before the advertised dates was duly delivered, with the exception of a relatively small quantity for one section of Dublin. Special attention is being devoted to the problem of dealing with the growing Christmas traffic in the light of last year's experience.

The re-equipment of the larger offices with modern sorting fittings was completed during the year. The general reorganisation of postal services in rural areas was continued and a daily frequency of delivery and a better standard of service were provided in the head office districts of Tuam, Skibbereen and Sligo. The groundwork on the reorganisation of Bandon, Killarney and Tralee districts was also undertaken and effect will shortly be given to the schemes prepared for these three centres. It is hoped this year to undertake the reorganisation of the services in the head office districts of Castlerea, Enniscorthy, Galway, Limerick and Waterford.

A special postage stamp in the 2d. and 1/3 denominations was issued in July, 1954, to commemorate the centenary of the opening of the Catholic University of Ireland under the rectorship of Dr. (afterwards Cardinal) Newman. In December 8d. and 1/3 denominations of air mail stamps, printed by the recess process, were issued. The designs replaced the 1d. and 3d. air mail issues which were withdrawn.

Telegraph traffic suffered a further drop last year, the number of telegrams handled being 3,161,000 as compared with 3,375,000 during the previous year.

As the House is aware, the telegraph service presents a serious problem, to which I shall refer again later, of high costs of operation, low receipts and declining traffic. The question of reducing expenditure on the service has been the subject of exhaustive investigation and a scheme has been worked out to secure substantial economies in operating costs which constitute the bulk of the expenditure. The scheme is primarily designed to reduce the number of handlings per telegram to a minimum. Already the use of the telephone for direct transmission of telegrams from accepting office to delivery office has been considerably extended and appreciable savings have been secured in this way by elimination of re-transmission costs at intermediate offices.

Hitherto, owing to the extensive use of the morse method of transmission, it has not been possible to adjust costs to declining traffic except within very broad limits. The policy of abolishing morse is, however, now well under way; it has been discontinued at 47 offices leaving about 40 offices still to be dealt with. The change over at these places is held up primarily by lack of suitable lines, but this difficulty will be largely overcome within the next year. Teleprinter equipment has to date been installed at 21 main offices. There will altogether be some 30 such offices for handling long distance telegraph traffic. These offices are, or will be, connected directly to the Central Telegraph Office at Dublin where traffic between the teleprinter offices and traffic between teleprinter offices here and teleprinter offices in Great Britain will be switched, thus cutting out a considerable amount of re-transmission work at Dublin. The question of installing automatic telegraph switching equipment in the Central Telegraph Office for this purpose is at present at an advanced stage of investigation.

During 1954 telegraph facilities were provided at 40 additional sub-offices and the old radio telegraph equipment serving the larger islands was replaced by modern radio telephone equipment. Telephone calls may now be made over the radio links from the islands to subscribers on the mainland.

The growth of the telephone service continued during 1954. Trunk calls totalled 12,780,000, an increase of over 8 per cent. on the 1953 figure. Local calls increased by 1,685,000 to 82,000,000. 6,300 applications for telephone service were received and a total of 6,543 new subscribers' lines were provided. At 31st December there were some 3,600 applicants on the waiting list.

The foregoing figures were, of course, affected by the extensive storm damage during the latter portion of the year which caused very serious disruption of trunk and subscribers' circuits and for a period necessitated virtual suspension of new construction work. Although all interrupted services have long since been restored, the effects of the storm are still being felt in arrears of construction work which accumulated when restoration work had to be undertaken.

In Dublin, telephones are being provided readily in areas where the plant position is good. In many areas in the city and suburbs, however, there are acute underground cable shortages. Until comparatively recently such difficulties could be overcome by local underground relief schemes, but the high connection rate of recent years has made heavy demands on the capacity of the main (as distinct from local) cables and it has been necessary to undertake major recabling schemes affecting most of the Dublin automatic area. Good progress has been made in complete recabling of large blocks in the Crown Alley, Ship Street and Merrion exchange areas and in the north main exchange area which covers the central city area north of the river. In the suburbs major cabling schemes are on the point of completion at Sutton and Dalkey. This work is being extended as rapidly as our skilled engineering staff resources will permit to relieve cable shortages in the remainder of the city proper and the suburbs.

Unfortunately, major underground schemes take a considerable time to complete and it is quite impracticable to cater for more than a few localities at one time—hence long delays in reaching particular areas are unavoidable. I am hopeful, however, that it may be practicable to expedite progress by putting more work out to contract and so supplementing the Department's efforts. In the meantime in order to use to the best advantage what lines are available in difficult areas shared service is being offered to applicants where the plant position permits. Under this arrangement two subscribers share a line to the exchange but they have different telephone numbers and get separate accounts.

Outside of Dublin, arrears of construction work in respect of subscribers' applications and trunk lines were reduced, although progress in this direction was, and is still, affected by the extensive storm damage to which I have already referred. The rural call office scheme for providing telephones in every rural post office has been virtually completed; applications for telephones involving normal work are being cleared on demand or within a few months in most of the larger exchange areas; and long outstanding applications involving abnormal work, which were deferred pending completion of the rural call office scheme, are being cleared roughly in order of year of application.

Fifty-four telephone kiosks were provided in 1954 and at least as many are scheduled for erection this year.

A new automatic exchange linked with the Dublin automatic network was opened in October last at Sutton (serving the Sutton and Howth areas). A similar exchange will be brought into service at Foxrock within the next few months and it is hoped to open automatic exchanges at Whitehall and Walkinstown before the end of the year.

Kildare manual exchange was converted to automatic working and recently small automatic units of new design have been used to provide automatic service at some small exchanges in County Waterford. Cahir manual exchange has now also been converted to automatic working.

A new auto-manual exchange at Mullingar is expected to be ready for service about August next. Automatic exchanges will be provided later in the year at Greystones, Cobh, Celbridge, Lucan and Rath Luirc.

Switchboard equipment was extended during 1954 at 80 exchanges and modern equipment installed at Ennis, Carlow, Bandon and Monaghan. Old switchboard equipment will be replaced by modern equipment this year, it is hoped, at Thurles, Ballina, Tralee and Wexford.

The trunk service was improved by the addition of some 4,600 miles of trunk circuits. Work on the underground cable from Dublin to Mullingar with branches to Athlone and Sligo is proceeding apace. The Dublin-Mullingar circuits are already in service and the branch to Athlone will be finished within a few months. The whole scheme is due to be completed by the middle of next year.

Apart from the routes affected by the cable scheme, the trunk programme for the current year includes provision for thousands of miles of additional circuits throughout the country by installation of multi-channel carrier systems on the longer routes and erection of additional physical circuits on shorter routes. This programme will greatly reduce the number of routes on which calls are now being abnormally delayed.

Continuous service was introduced in 1954 at 11 exchanges where the hours of service were previously restricted and the hours of service were extended by two hours per day at 41 small exchanges. Over 97 per cent. of all subscribers connected to the telephone system now have continuous service. Exchanges where the hours of service are restricted are the very small ones where the extra cost of 24 hour attendance would be out of all proportion to the extra revenue; indeed, the extra cost would in many cases exceed the rentals of the subscribers concerned. The solution of this problem probably lies in the installation of small automatic units connected to the nearest operator-staffed exchange. Hitherto, such units have not been available at suitable costs, but the position has improved and we have now in operation some units of a kind which may meet our requirements in this respect.

New telephone exchange buildings were completed during the year at Whitehall and Foxrock (Dublin) and at Mullingar and Greystones, and others are in course of erection at Limerick and Sligo. New post offices (in which provision is being made to meet the requirements of the telephone service) are also being erected at Drogheda, Kilrush, Rath Luirc and Cootehill. A new branch post office was opened at South Anne Street, Dublin, to replace the Duke Street office. Structural alterations to provide new or improved facilities at existing buildings were carried out or are being put in hand at Cahir, Tralee, Ballina, Ballymote, Monaghan, Kilkenny, Dundalk, Fermoy and Clontarf.

In the present financial year provision has been made for the commencement of the erection of new post offices and telephone exchanges at Galway, Naas, Letterkenny and Athenry, as well as telephone exchanges at Palmerstown and Dundrum, County Dublin. Provision is also being made for the commencement of work on schemes for the alteration and improvement of existing buildings at Loughrea, Roscommon, Bray, Kildare, Carrick-on-Shannon, Carrick-on-Suir, Cork Head Office and Longford. The Commissioners of Public Works are engaged in the preparation of plans of new post offices for Wicklow, Youghal and Droichead Nua.

Good progress continues to be made with the planning of the proposed new combined letter and parcel sorting office for Dublin.

Deposits in the Post Office Savings Bank rose from £14,073,000 in 1953 to £14,517,000 in 1954 and withdrawals from £10,812,000 to £11,101,000, a net surplus of £3,416,000 as compared with £3,261,000 for the previous year. Interest earned during the year is estimated at £1,589,000 and the total amount standing to the credit of depositors on the 31st December, 1954, was approximately £66,772,000.

Deposits during the year by the Trustee Savings Banks amounted to £1,162,500 and withdrawals to £508,000, an increase of £182,000 on deposits and of £46,000 on withdrawals. The balance to credit of the Trustee Savings Banks at the end of the year, including £285,000 for interest, is approximately £10,229,000.

An appreciable amount was withdrawn from the Post Office Savings Bank and the Trustee Savings Banks for reinvestment in 4½ per cent. National Loan.

The estimated combined balances, Post Office and Trustee Savings Banks, on the 31st December, 1954, amounted to £77,001,000 compared with £71,057,000 on the same date in 1953.

Business for the year showed a decrease as compared with the previous year. Receipts from sales of certificates amounted to £2,364,000 repayment of principal to £1,318,000 and interest to £445,000. Corresponding figures for 1953 were £3,037,000, £1,375,000 and £517,000. The decrease in sales represents the natural falling off in purchases after the exceptionally high demand in the first and second years of the fifth issue. The decrease in repayments was partly due to smaller investments by Savings Certificate holders in the 4½ per cent. National Loan than in the National Loan floated in 1953, and partly to a fall in the amount of transfers from other issues to the fifth issue.

The amount of principal due to investors at the end of the year stood at £17,980,000 compared with £16,935,000 at the end of 1953.

I am glad to say that on a commercial account basis the deficit on the overall working of the Department has declined and this despite very heavy additional expenditure in respect of salary and wage awards and higher costs generally. For the year 1953-54 the overall deficit was £343,860 and for 1954-55 it is estimated that the deficit will be £200,000 approximately, viz:—postal service deficit, £126,000; telegraph service deficit, £352,500; telephone service profit, £279,300.

While it is satisfactory that the overall financial position shows signs of improving it will be realised from the figures I have just given that the loss on the telegraph service continues to be very heavy. Each year since 1922 the working of this service has resulted in a loss and in recent years the loss has shown a tendency to increase. In 1953-54, the last year for which audited figures are available, expenditure on the telegraph service amounted to £646,000 while revenue only amounted to £295,000. In other words revenue was only 46 per cent. of expenditure. This continuing loss on the telegraphs is a permanent obstacle to the Department's efforts to become self-supporting.

In 1953 the previous Government decided that telegraph charges should be increased and to enable this to be done my predecessor introduced the Telegraph Bill, 1953. In sponsoring this measure he explained fully the need for higher telegraph charges. He indicated, however, that, before fixing revised charges, he proposed to await the report of a departmental committee which he had set up, with the widest terms of reference, to examine the whole problem of the heavy deficit in the working of the service and to make recommendations to improve its financial position.

This committee has concluded a very thorough examination of the telegraph service. In addition to recommendations of an organisational nature, the adoption of which will lead to substantial economies and more efficient working, the committee also recommends that the present telegraph charges should be increased. Some of these charges were fixed as far back as 1920, the others in 1928 and 1937. The committee's report has been considered by the Government which has decided that in view of the continuing loss on the telegraph service, it is essential that telegraph charges should be increased. A White Paper summarising the committee's report and giving details of the increased charges will be published shortly.

In conclusion, I would like to express my appreciation of the zealous service given during the year by the staff of all ranks.

Mr. Childers

First of all, I should like to thank the Minister for the helpful attitude he has shown in regard to matters concerning his Department during the past year. I always think of the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs as a member of the Government entitled to hit out as hard as he can in the political sphere outside his Ministry, but in his Ministry he has to keep politics as far apart as possible from his administration, and so far as the present Minister is concerned, he has continued in that tradition. I hope he will not be attacked on political grounds as often in the next year as I was in some years of my office when I was conducting the Ministry. Certainly, he can have no complaints as far as that is concerned during the past year.

I have very little to say of a political character and I think I had better begin by referring to matters where political policy is involved and where the Minister himself is only partly responsible. I may as well deal with the question of Post Office savings first of all, because the rest of what I have to say deals with matters mostly related to the administration of the service where there is no acute difference politically between the two sides of the House.

During the first period of the Coalition Government's office there were repeated warnings by the then Minister for Finance that unless the country saved more it would be unable to pay its way and there would be a necessity for the restriction of expenditure. Announcements were made that the Government at that time was contemplating ways and means of increasing the volume of savings particularly in the Post Office. I found, when I became Minister, that nothing had been done about it and no special steps had been taken. During the three years when the Fianna Fáil Government was in office I appointed a most able man, Mr. Charles Kelly, as Director of Savings, and Mr. Kelly under my guidance—I might add he is a person of imagination and considerable ability, a former Director of Radio Éireann— made all kinds of proposals for ways and means of advertising Post Office savings and encouraging people to increase their savings and encouraging the opening of new savings books.

A number of these proposals were adopted and were mentioned by the Minister in reply to a parliamentary question the other day including the inauguration of far more imaginative advertising and so forth. A number of proposals still awaited consideration or had, in fact, been—at least in the initial stages—questioned by the Department of Finance as of doubtful value. During the course of the general election among the few tempting things that were said by the present Government Ministers who were then in opposition was the proposal that much more could be done to encourage savings, whereas, in fact, as I have pointed out a Director of Savings was appointed and had already increased the tempo of propaganda for savings by various means of which the Minister is aware and I had expected that as the Director of Savings was only a very short time in his office during the former Government's period of office that after a lapse of years we would be able to see some new plans formulated.

I am not criticising the Minister because I think the Minister is only in one sense the agent for the Minister for Finance, but I am suggesting that it is about time that the wordy promises of more propaganda about savings were implemented. I have not noticed any great outbreak of even more vivid advertising; I have noticed no decision being taken about the formation of savings committees in industries as practised abroad in many countries where employers help to save for their workers and the amounts are placed in savings books, and where the whole administration is carried out by means of local committees on which the employers are represented.

There has been no decision about that yet. Nor, apparently, has there been any decision by the Minister for Finance in directing the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs to proceed with the experiment to see whether, if there were savings banks or special offices for savings established in medium-sized towns where the public might go —particularly those who require absolute proof of secrecy in regard to the savings they deposit—there might be a still greater inflow of savings. In other words, along with the commercial banks in the larger towns, there would be a small attractive office kept specially for savings where people could go and where there would be a staff of a special kind whose general character and personality would attract people.

There were other proposals—I have forgotten them—but what I am saying is that I trust that the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs will press upon the Minister for Finance to implement the wordy promises that were made when it was stated that we were not doing enough about encouraging savings now that a director of savings is available with considerable imagination and now that a considerable time has elapsed since these proposals were first formulated.

I do not think I need say very much more of a political character, but I am very much aware that an immense amount has yet to be done to encourage savings. I am not even satisfied with the more imaginative advertising that was initiated during the term of office of Fianna Fáil. I think the advertising was better; I think still more could be done, and I think possibly still more could be done in relation to rather spectacular advertising to be put on Post Office vans. I do not think we have yet seen the best that can be done in that direction and many others.

It would be very easy to produce films telling the story about savings. The Minister could ask to see the Swedish film about savings in which there is no mention during the course of the film that people should save money and put it in the Post Office, but the implication is left, and the film is all the more effective for that reason. The film has already been shown and it is a good beginning but I think even better films can be produced.

So far as Post Office services are concerned, I am glad to note that the losses which became acute in the 1950 period are gradually diminishing. I am glad to see they are diminishing because the postal charges would seem to be almost at maximum having regard to our present productivity and present value of money. I hope the Minister will not hesitate to press upon the methods and organisation section of his Department to do all that is possible to secure further economies in the expenditure on the postal side without sacrificing the service. In that connection I hope that the Minister if he possibly can will speed up the reorganising of the postal services in the areas where this has had to be done. We have now been at this job for a very considerable number of years and I see there is a great number of areas where reorganisation still has to take place.

The Minister is aware that during the period when an area is awaiting reorganisation there is considerable disturbance in regard to the normal movement, promotion and retirement of staff because of the fact that a reorganisation is contemplated. There may be all sorts of transfers and changes, and in order not to press too hardly upon the officers of the Post Office who might otherwise suffer there are these—what I might call—special conditions that arise and they do not bring efficiency in their train. It seems to me that that business should be completed as quickly as possible. I am well aware there is only a limited number of officers in the Department who have the special knowledge required to plan a postal area but I trust the Minister will expedite the work.

During the time of the Fianna Fáil Government I asked for an inquiry into the use of mechanised transport for postal deliveries and an experiment took place of a very preliminary kind in regard to the use of motor bicycles and carriers. I am not convinced that we have properly examined that question and I would ask the Minister to examine again the question of using mechanised transport in rural areas. It would seem to me to be a natural concomitant of modern life and although I am aware that the cost of maintaining small mechanised equipment whether motor bicycles or auto-cycles or small vans is heavy and involves all sorts of administrative difficulties and involves such difficulties as stores, garage accommodation and repair facilities, I still think in areas where houses are widely separated we shall have to make a beginning some day and the best way of making it is not to conduct a preliminary experiment of a purely theoretical kind but to mechanise one area, if it can be done without hurting the employment interests of any person, and see the results and measure them over a period. I am convinced that there will have to be an element of mechanisation in the future if the public is to be served with speedy deliveries of post and if the cost of so doing is to be kept at a reasonable level.

I am not criticising the experiment that was carried out but even in private business experiments when undertaken at a particular time do not seem to be successful and later on the company has to make another experiment of a more exhaustive kind and very often some more modern method is adopted and the fruits of the first experiment are discarded.

I was very glad to hear that new uniforms were about to be adopted. Partly arising out of the British tradition, of all the public services the postmen had the least smart uniforms, and whereas there are countries in Europe where postmen measure up to the police or even to the army, of course in country districts it is not poossible to maintain uniforms in condition particularly when postmen have to travel up by-ways and boreens and so forth. I am very glad that the Minister has agreed that it is in the long run economic to use a really good, smart cloth for postmen's uniforms and for the uniform to be exceedingly well-fitted. I hope the Minister will see to it that the new uniforms are kept as clean as possible under the circumstances, and again I think it will be found economic to ensure the continuing cleanliness of uniforms, bearing in mind all the practical difficulties.

I would like to ask the Minister whether he could not do more publicity for the charge-on-delivery service which was instituted in the last few years and whether he thinks the public is fully aware that such a service exists. I am aware that the service has been found rather costly to administer, that it is a source of considerable difficulty to postmen, but nevertheless it is a feature of modern commercial life and although it has been found necessary to make rather high charges for that service the Minister might find if it became more popular, giving a greater turnover, the charge for collecting the cost of a parcel from the purchaser of that parcel could possibly be reduced. I have met literally dozens of people who are still unaware that such a service exists and, as it is of immense benefit to people living in the country where, for example, people are already beginning to use it in connection with the dry-cleaning of clothes—I understand many tens of thousands of parcels are distributed each year—it obviously could be extended for other purposes. I think the Minister should make up his mind to face the difficulties involved, the difficulties that the postmen have to face, the difficulties of the cost, and try to make it more popular.

Equally, I wonder whether the business community are fully aware of the service by which an envelope can be returned without a stamp in the case, for example, of a sample or circular sent out offering new services or goods or samples. I would like to ask the Minister whether he has evidence that all the commercial community know of that service, because there again, I have met quite a number of people who did not even know it had started. That was the case even during 1954.

There is one more service about which there is no publicity and which is hardly ever used, and that is, the rather elaborate and extraordinary system by which a letter or parcel may be sent by train or bus from one place to another and actually delivered by express outside the normal postal hours of delivery. At the moment, it is a fairly complicated business, because telegrams have to be sent and messengers have to be summoned by quite an elaborate process. Quite a number of postmasters have never yet had to avail themselves of these services, but there are occasions when people wish to send urgent parcels or letters when the post has gone and when the parcel or letter should be sent before the post leaves and where a bus or train service exists, when this service could be utilised. I am wondering if the public know of it fully, because I have mentioned it to a number of people in the last two years, people who were badly stuck for want of an immediate delivery service and the people I spoke to had no idea that the service existed.

I am glad to hear that the Minister is pressing forward with the reconstruction of post offices and the improvement of existing post offices, and I hope that the Minister will continue the tradition of the Department in the years when I was Minister and that he will utterly abolish the English Victorian brown-coloured paint which had infected the post offices of this country far and wide, and that he will insist in all redecorations of post offices that whatever colour is used, unless the wood is natural mahogany, we will have bright colours and that we will not get a return of what was purely a British Victorian tradition. I am not blaming the British entirely for it; it just so happened that it came across from there. In the case of a wood like mahogany, there is no purpose in staining it in anything but its own colour, but otherwise bright colours should be used, and I hope the Minister will see that that tradition is continued.

I note from what the Minister says that there was a certain amount of congestion last year in regard to deliveries of Christmas mail, and I think he is quite right in trying to decide whether further steps should be taken to expedite deliveries. Equally, I think he should do some more publicity to encourage the public to be reasonable. I do not know whether the issue of notices—I think there were also occasional broadcasts—is sufficient. In any event it was quite obvious last Christmas that deliveries of Christmas mail became almost impossible under the prevailing circumstances.

I would like to ask the Minister exactly what stage has been reached in regard to the provision of the new sorting office at Amiens Street. I know that a good deal has been done, but when I hear the Minister say in his speech that plans are under active consideration it strikes a rather unhappy note. Plans are so long under consideration for so many years past in regard to that matter that if the Minister could give some assurance that even working drawings are becoming available it would be very helpful. The Pearse Street sorting office is utterly out of date and not a source of pride to us in any sense.

I put a question to the Minister in regard to the progress made in the establishment of temporary full-time auxiliary postmen. He informed me that the number of full-time posts has increased from 2,202 to 2,386 between 1950 and 1955. I always felt that that progress was very slow and I would like to inquire from the Minister whether it would not be possible to have more frequent examinations or whether there are difficulties, whether he feels that a great number of these temporary postmen would be unlikely at this stage to pass their examinations, or what steps he could take to increase the number of fully established postmen. A full-time temporary postman, although he may secure a gratuity when he retires, retires on a very slender basis of income and it would seem to me that no Government on either side have had sufficient regard to the necessity for increasing the number of full-time established postmen.

Could the Minister say whether he has had time to examine the status of the junior female postal sorters whose remuneration is, by any standards, extremely low? As I understand it, girls who take up these positions and who happen to come mostly from the country receive an income from the Post Office which leaves so little margin over their mere subsistence costs that the Minister should press the Department of Finance to reorientate the scale of pay of these junior girl sorters employed mostly, I believe, in the postal order section. I confess that I failed to take any useful action in the matter but I always felt that, once the period of Korean inflation was over, that when the cost of living was at least levelling out, when the Post Office was no longer suffering from acute inflationary conditions and was finding its expenditure rapidly mounting above its income, as was the case from about 1950 continuously onwards until 1953, more might be done to deal with this particular class.

What does the Minister think of the present situation whereby he has the personal appointment of all the temporary postmen, cleaners and many other classes of people in the State? For a considerable period this was the subject of a good deal of patronage on either side of the House. I found in regard to applications that, however, by and large, pressure for the appointment of a particular person was practically non-existent because under present conditions the preferences that exist already in regard to the classes of people to be appointed are absolutely evident to everybody concerned. The fact that a man is unemployed, has a large family and is otherwise suitable, gives him priority, and a man with a large family who has Army service has even greater priority. I found that appointment in many cases was either perfectly obvious or that there were several candidates with equal capacity.

At this stage of our history I think it would be possible for the Minister to save considerable administration expenses by allowing the postmasters to appoint temporary postmen. I see no purpose in all the machinery required to bring those appointments up to the ministerial office. It seems to me a further stage in the sophistication of the Post Office which everybody desires. The Minister is perfectly aware of the reason why patronage existed, because of the period up to 1932 and the consequential period in relation to which it was felt necessary to remedy a position that was created through the civil war. Such things have occurred in other countries and are still occurring. However, I found that Deputies on both sides of the House were usually sponsoring the same person and that was the person who most merited the post.

I can see no reason for the added expense to the Minister of having to canalise all these appointments into his office. I am sure he will agree with me when I say that in most cases no matter what political pressure is put on him there is generally only one person to be appointed or there are perhaps three equally qualified candidates whose names you could place in a hat and in that way choose the person who would get the position.

I wish also to speak about the question of the permanent issue of our stamps. I hope the Minister will continue to fight the Department of Finance in regard to their view that philatelic sales when a new issue appears do not justify the cost of the new design for a stamp. I found myself that the Department of Finance was the most pessimistic administration in Europe. I found that in every other country in Europe the Departments of Finance there believed that reasonably frequent changes in the permanent stamp issue did not cost the administration any money in the net sense. I found also some administrations where they claimed to make revenue for the State by producing new stamps.

The Republic of San Moreno and the Republic of Liechtenstein are examples of small States where revenue is made by changing stamp issues. We have the oldest permanent stamp issue in Europe. I think in every other country it has changed with the exception of Britain. They have the continuing tradition that the monarch's head must be on the stamp and to that extent they have not changed their stamps in any fundamental particulars, but they have at least changed the design.

Some countries encourage the sale of stamps by advertising the idea of stamp collecting and in many a German post office there is a window section devoted to encouraging stamp collection and to encouraging young people to learn geography and history by collecting stamps. The Commissioners for Revenue have never admitted that it was possible to encourage stamp collecting here and thus to increase the sale of stamps by selling to stamp collectors. The turnover on the sales of our stamps, as the Minister knows, is enormous and it should be possible to reckon a very minute cost per stamp for a new design including the making of the design of the stamp and the recess engraving process. As far as I know, about 274,000,000 stamps are used per year, and in the lower denominations the numbers for each value are anything from 30,000,000 to 70,000,000 per value.

Even of the stamps of higher value from 8d. to 4d.—there are 3,000,000 and 5,000,000 of each printed every year. It seems fantastic therefore to be able to say that we are going on forever using the same permanent issue when we have admirable opportunity for advertising the country and of giving to our people and to those abroad pictures of our castles and abbeys and saints and scientists, of our industries and of our agricultural life. Ideal and magnificent new seals could be designed and some of the older designs perfected. I might add that the designs of many of our permanent issue stamps are what one might call the Irish-Victorian style. If we have a design at all it is linked with the designing fashion of the British during the 19th century and it is far from perfect.

For example, take a stamp which consists of the map of Ireland. It has a Celtic arch. The arch is not a sculptured arch; there is an appalling—I would not like to use the word because it would be unparliamentary—mixture in the design. It is very bad Celtic art and is very bad British-Victorian art as well. The present 3d. stamp has the Cross of Cong. If you examine the design of the cross you will find it is not really a beautiful architectural design at all, nor is it a beautiful cross, although it would have been quite possible to have copied the actual Cross of Cong and have incorporated it in the design of a new stamp. It would be possible also to have a far better artistic indication of a cross whether or not a Celtic type was used.

The present contribution is not a credit. If you examine the four provinces stamp you will find that the arms of the four provinces are perfectly satisfactory, but the floral design behind the provinces is, in the first place, invisible. There is too much detail to be seen by the average eye. Secondly, it consists of closely interwoven shamrocks and the fewer closely interwoven shamrocks we have on our stamps the better for the future of this country.

I should like also to ask the Minister whether he has been able to make any improvement in the mechanisation of the issuing of stamps at the larger post offices. I understand it has been extremely difficult to find a machine which will issue a half-dozen 3d. stamps at once and save the customer time. Stamps could be given in the form of a roll. Have any better designs been found of such machines?

Another question I want to ask the Minister is whether or not he has been able to reduce the cost of the handling of 6d postal orders, because at one time the State was losing money on their handling. Accordingly the poundage had to be increased. Whatever amusement the public here get from the doing of crosswords, it became obvious the Department should not be allowed to lose money through the handling of those postal orders. The poundage was accordingly raised and now it is very high. I should like to know if any method has been found for reducing the cost of handling postal orders of small denominations and if some simple method could be made available so that the losses on the handling of these postal orders would be overcome and economies effected.

The question was being examined in 1954 of the counter staff in the Dublin postal district and I think it was found that a certain amount of reorganisation was required. I hope the Minister will see that speedy progress is made in this matter. It would be to the advantage of everyone concerned, including the staff. In so far as the telephone service is concerned I note from the information given by the Minister that owing to the storms last year it was not possible to maintain the tremendous rate of progress recorded in 1953 in regard to the provision of new exchange lines, kiosks, call-offices, and junction circuits and I do hope, now that the storm has passed and that the many hundreds of miles of cable have been restored, that the Minister will be able to resume the progress made in 1953.

The Minister may remember that the staff increased from 1950 to 1953 by 16 per cent. but that in 1953 as compared with 1950 there were 14 per cent. more exchange lines connected and, a record of all time, 7,600 exchange lines in operation. There was a 77 per cent. increase in the number of kiosks provided, an increase of 208 per cent. in the number of rural call-offices opened, 223 per cent. more miles of trunk and junction circuits added and there were 133 per cent. more automatic exchanges provided. That included some work in hands before 1953. In addition, 29 exchanges were extended. That was a good example of what Government administration can do when a tremendous effort is made and I hope the Minister will be able to begin the resumption of that progress as far as is practicable and bearing in mind the changes which take place in the nature of the work done and the fact that putting the work into operation now may be more difficult than it was previously.

Perhaps in 1953 the work being done was less difficult than that which must now be planned; perhaps the circuits to be installed now would be of a different type. I hope, however, that the Minister will be able to get back to the 1953 level. I always like to mention those figures in order to prove that as far as the engineering staff of the telephone service is concerned there could not be any evidence of any great redundancy in staff because if a staff is increased by 16 per cent. and is able to do nearly twice the work there can be no evidence of redundancy. In his speech the Minister spoke of the recabling operations in Dublin and he mentioned that because of certain difficulties it might be more practical to give some of the work out on contract. I was rather disappointed at that because I had hoped the Minister would be able to tell the House that it had been decided the work of laying these cables would be carried out by contract.

I should like to ask the Minister how soon the decision will be made because, as the Minister is aware, the filling up of the existing cable system came rather rapidly upon the engineers in the Post Office and it would seem to me to be very, very urgent work indeed. My own belief is that, if there is goodwill shown by everybody, it should be possible to do some quite unusual contract work even if it means a change in the normal procedure and the routine of the engineering section. I hope the Department of Finance are not in any way impeding the Minister in getting that work done because it involves some slight changes in regulations in regard to accountancy. I hope, whatever else occurs, the Minister will not allow the Department of Finance to hold up any new method by which the cabling work is to be done.

I trust the Minister will press on with the construction of automatic exchanges in the suburban districts of Dublin and County Dublin. I know a considerable amount of work has been done but that work ought to be completed at the earliest possible moment.

As the Minister knows, the telephone service is paying the losses of the rest of the service and although a good profit, some £286,000, was made by the telephone service, the Minister is also aware that it would seem very difficult for him to increase the telephone charges and very unwise. At the same time, the actual net profit of the telephone service is extremely fine; there is not very much margin; the £286,000 is produced from a very large turnover and it would seem essential to proceed with the work of increasing the efficiency of the telephone service in every way possible.

I should like to ask the Minister whether the mechanisation of the telephone accounts is continuing, because there were great difficulties in deciding what method of mechanisation to use and what machines to purchase. Certain machines were purchased experimentally or were rented experimentally and at the same time other changes were made with a view to increasing the amount of accountancy work that could be done by each official. I should like to ask him how far that is proceeding now.

Much can be done still—in fact, great improvement has always been taking place under the aegis of the officers of the Department—in reducing paper work and I was amazed to find how much paper work had been in fact eliminated in order to improve technique and to reduce costs. I should like to ask whether the proposals that were being made in 1954 for the reduction of paper work had been adopted.

I should like also to ask the Minister whether he still considers the present engineering districts to be the best that can be devised or whether they are too much based on rail transport and whether there should not be a revision of the engineering districts to take into account modern methods of transport and the general development of the telephone service.

At one time it was extremely difficult to get assistant engineers in the Post Office, particularly graduates from the university, partly because of the tremendous attraction of the higher wages in Great Britain and partly because of the conditions in the service itself. I notice that the salary scales of the engineering staff of the Post Office, in the higher grades, show that there has been completely inadequate compensation for the increase in the cost of living. That applies, of course, to other officers of the Department but the development of electronic work in Great Britain and other countries and the tremendous developments in the nuclear field and the huge expansion of the British electronic industry must be making it difficult even to keep the existing staff or to secure additional staff. I believe that in the technical field it is entirely wrong not to pay engineers what they deserve. I can see little justification for a rate of pay in the case of a district engineer, for example, that does not relate to the increase in the cost of living that has taken place since 1939.

I am well aware that the Minister is only partly responsible for salary scales, that it is part of the work of the Department of Finance but I know the Department of Finance have found through the years that they have continuously to increase the salary scales of engineering staffs in order to recruit staff. They had to increase the salaries of meteorological engineers and of mechanical engineers to the Board of Works. Men who are looking forward to an interesting career, bringing some reward, are hardly likely to be attracted if the salary scales in the Post Office for what is the most vital work, the planning and design of new telephone circuits, are kept at such a figure that a man who becomes a district engineer is not compensated for the increase in the cost of living that has taken place since 1939.

I should add that I found it extremely difficult, outside of what was being done in the Department of Finance, because of the inter-relationship of all salary scales and, of course, during a period of acute inflation these matters were still more difficult to work out. One had to rely on the general improvement in the salary scales as a result of the award made prior to 1951 and later but the problem still exists and will have to be solved.

I should like also to ask the Minister whether a decision has yet been made in regard to the arbitration claims of some other classes of staff in the Post Office where there seem to be some particular men. I should like to ask him where, in the general movement towards arbitration claims, come the postal sorters, the post office clerks, the clerical officers and the female telephonists. It would appear that, as I have said, now that the inflationary period is over and that it is possible to adjust the salaries by individual arbitration claims, these classes still deserve consideration. I should like to ask the Minister whether some decisions are likely to take place in regard to them.

The Minister has, no doubt, found that he is pressed to establish kiosks all over the country, and the pressure is difficult to resist for obvious reasons. I understand that the annual cost of a kiosk, which is placed upon it before any profit can be made, is £35. I hope the Minister will adopt a consistent attitude in regard to the granting of kiosks, that he will either be liberal and say it will be at the expense of the service or that he will say that in the long run, if we establish too many kiosks, telephone charges will have to be raised in order to meet the enormous cost of inadequately used kiosks, and the only result will be a burden upon the public. I found great difficulty in regard to that when I was in his position.

I think the Minister might remind the public again that, although telephone charges were increased, they still are very moderate compared with those in 1939 and, naturally, with a view to attracting subscribers and to increasing the volume of calls. The rental charges have increased by only 50 per cent. since 1939 and the call charges have increased by amounts which vary from 28 to 33 to 40 to 50 per cent. There is very little one can buy or very little service one can get in this country at a figure so little above that of 1939. Although I am quite sure there are a few others with the Post Office, they are certainly very few, indeed, from that point of view.

I come now to the telegraph service. I am glad to hear that the Minister is installing teleprinters and at a fairly rapid rate. I would ask him whether or not the departmental committee, when they were considering the question of telegraph charges, considered the use of greeting telegrams. A great many countries in Europe have, I understand, a greeting telegram service in respect of which the Post Office make money by charging for the greetings telegrams. Have the departmental committee considered the offer of that service to the public here?

As the Minister stated, the telegraph service has been the Cinderella of the three services and the taxpayer has been bled continuously during the years in respect of the sending of telegrams. Continuously during the years, the deficit in the Post Office has mostly been caused by the losses in the telegraph service. I think one can put it this way. If the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs decided, quite illegally, to accumulate all the losses in the telegraph service for seven years and were then suddenly to inform the Minister for Finance of the fact, the Minister for Finance would have to impose a tax of 3d. on every pint of stout for a 12-month period in order to defray the losses on the telegraph service for the previous seven years. I should like to put it that way in order to give as picturesque an idea as possible of the constant burden on the taxpayer of these continuous losses.

I note that in 1954 some 2,300,000 telegrams were sent at a loss of 2/- each. As the Minister points out, the rates have been unchanged for many years. I do not want to take a political attitude in regard to this. As the Minister says, I did commit the former Government to an increase in telegraph charges on the grounds that the taxpayers should be relieved of the cost of maintaining the postal, telephone and telegraph service. I remember that when we took steps to reduce the loss on the three services we were told business would be ruined, business would be crushed, and a lot of other nonsense. I pointed out over and over again that, though the previous Minister for Posts and Telegraphs had quietly and unobtrusively increased charges during the previous two years by £1,000,000 a year, he had not been able to make up the losses and further increases in charges had to be made so that the general level of charges in the postal, telegraph and telephone services are in the order of 50 per cent. or less over those operating in 1939.

The position of the Post Office in general is that between 1939 and 1954 there were, I understand, aggregate profits of £1,000,000 and aggregate losses of £2.8 million. Therefore, there has been a net loss since 1939 of £1.8 million and most of that has been caused by the loss on the telegraph service. I should mention the fact that in Great Britain, with a far higher density of population, the telegraph service only recently lost £4,000,000 a year. Therefore, there can be no question that the losses here were due to any inefficiency or lack of zeal on the part of the officers of the Department. The greater part of the losses, as the Minister knows, is due to the high cost of delivering telegrams compared with the charge for them. I agree with the Minister that to lose money on the postal, telephone and telegraph services is absolutely wrong. It is bad for the temperament of our people. It must inevitably encourage inefficiency. No matter how efficient or zealous the officers may be, a losing service can only, in the long run, encourage still more losses—and, as far as I can see, the loss on the three services amounted last year to 3? per cent. There is no reason or excuse for that. The service itself is simply a miniature feature of the whole of Government services and there is no special reason why it should lose money any more than the Government should lose money in conducting its total operations.

Take, for example, the E.S.B. or the Dublin Gas Company. There must be individual parts of these services which run uneconomically, and likewise in the case of the Post Office. There are rural telephone lines, and there are certain areas where telegrams are delivered at a loss. There must be postmen who, because they travel with few letters every day, are a source of loss to the Post Office. The losses should be recouped by the revenue of the Post Office in the wealthier and denser areas. There is no more excuse for the three services to lose money than there is for the Dublin Gas Company to lose money or for the E.S.B. to lose money or for the State to lose money. Now that C.I.E., with its long and tragic history of losses, is beginning to reach the point where it is hoped that the loss will be extinguished, it would be a desperate thing if the Department of Posts and Telegraphs were the last of the semi-industrialised services to be losing money. Therefore, I have to agree with the Minister that he should relieve the taxpayer by increasing the charges for telegrams—and if he can do it in a way which will cause the least difficulty and the least burden upon the public, why, then, I hope he will do so.

It is absolutely ridiculous, in the present state of our economy, for the taxpayer to pay for the cost of sending a telegram to somebody in the country congratulating him on the birth of a child. It is ludicrous hypocrisy that we should be in that state at the present time, particularly having regard to the improvement in financial conditions. Therefore, as I have said, the Minister found I was determined to make the service pay and I hope that, in the course of the next two years, we will be able to see a service that balances.

That is all I have to say except once more to express the hope that the Minister will do all he can to extend the facilities of the three services particularly in areas where quick communication will bring happiness to many people and at the same time that he will increase the efficiency of the services by every means that lies in his command.

Mr. McGrath

I should like to draw the attention of the Minister to a matter that caused a great amount of inconvenience last Christmas in Cork. I refer to the transferring of the liner mails to Dublin—mails that were usually landed at Cork and sorted in Cork. A number of protests were sent to the Minister and the excuse was given that it was the liner company who, for their own convenience, transferred the mail to Dublin. The Minister should see that these mails are delivered where he wants them, where it would be most convenient to sort them and where that work would give the usual extra employment that was always given.

I understand that one of the causes of the delay was that it was not easy to get extra staff in Dublin to do the sorting. This caused great hardship to a number of people who were looking forward to the usual financial gifts from their relations in America. In a great many cases, they did not get these until January. It also caused hardship to the people who were depending on employment in the sorting operations. An affair like that should never occur again, of these mails bypassing Cobh, going to Dublin to be sorted there and sent back again to Cork and district.

I should like to support Deputy Childers in his plea for the temporary postmen. The temporary postmen have been treated, as I said in Cork recently, very badly by all Governments. They have been doing a good service for 25 or 30 years and have then been thrown on one side. The Minister should very seriously consider doing what Deputy Childers suggests, that is, taking on more whole-time permanent postmen.

I should like also to draw the Minister's attention to the low rate of pay operating generally throughout his Department. Postmen, clerks and others do not seem to be anything like as well paid for their services as the employees of other Departments.

So far as Cork is concerned, we are not catering properly for the newly built up areas. It takes too long to make a decision as to whether there will be a sub-post office in a particular area or not and the usual reply that further development of the area is being awaited is, I think, entirely wrong. We should have more sub-post offices in newly built areas and more facilities in the form of kiosks, stamp machines and collection boxes which should not cost a terrible amount of money, but which would be a great convenience to the people. I think also that there should be a revision of the present collection boxes.

With regard to telephone kiosks, I know of one kiosk installed about 12 months ago which has not yet got a light in it. It is in my own area and I do not know what the cause of it is, but it is most difficult for a person going in there at night to find a number in the phone book when there is no light there.

There is also the question of young men and women getting appointments in the Post Office service, and, while I realise that there will not always be vacancies in their home headquarters, the Minister should as far as possible facilitate them in getting back to their homes as quickly as they can. He should see to it that a Dublin man or girl will not be doing a job in Cork, while a Cork man or girl is doing the same job in Dublin. This is especially the case where younger people are concerned. They would be much better off in their homes because they would be able to live more economically and would be still under parental control.

I should like to pay a tribute to the courtesy of all the officials with whom the public come in contact in Cork City and district. I do not think anybody can have any complaint about the way they are served by these officials, from the postman to the postmaster.

Mr. A. Byrne

I should like to support the request made to the Minister for an extension of the telephone system and to draw his attention to the need for kiosks in the City of Dublin, that is, in the added areas, the newly built-up areas, such as Ballyfermot, Cabra and all these housing areas of the municipality. They are not yet properly served with a telephone system and I appeal to the Minister to make an inquiry to see what can be done to extend the system of kiosks and to do so at a very early date, because these housing schemes from three to five miles outside the city are inadequately served at present.

I support the claim made by all sections with regard to the system of temporary postmen. It is not satisfactory and when it is found necessary to take on temporary postmen for permanent employment, they should go on the permanent service for the purposes of pay, pensions and holidays. The Department should not avail of temporary men for prolonged periods. These men are entitled to be put on the permanent staff and receive the benefits which go with permanent status.

The uniform of the postmen could be made far more attractive, and, as well as having a winter style of uniform, they should have a summer style of uniform.

Mr. Casey

I want to refer to the arrangements that obtain in the Department regarding the reappointment of staff who have been off for a long period because of T.B. Successive Ministers for Health have, quite rightly, urged all employers—private employers, public boards and companies—to have a scheme which would operate as leniently as possible in respect of staff who fall ill with T.B. To my amazement, it came to my notice quite recently in relation to Post Office staffs that the arrangements obtaining are not at all comparable with what one would expect in a Government Department. I know of cases, one of which I drew to the attention of the Minister, in which it was quite obvious to me that people who had to go away for treatment of T.B. came back to the Post Office service at a decided disadvantage.

I am conversant with the arrangements that the clerical staff and other grades have in C.I.E. in this regard and I can safely say that, no doubt at the behest of the Minister for Health, boards like C.I.E. are acting very fairly to their staffs. I urge the Minister to review the arrangements in his own Department in that respect. It is a shocking thing to find a Minister for Health urging lenient and sympathetic treatment for these people and another Department of Government not responding to the call. It is hard to expect private employers to respond in a manner in which the Departments themselves will not respond. I was really shocked to find that state of affairs existing and I would ask the Minister to look into it without delay. I think he will have to consult the Minister for Finance, who has some responsibility in the matter.

Deputy McGrath referred to telephone kiosks. In newly built-up areas around cities such as Cork, there is a great demand for these kiosks and for stamp vending machines at the sub-post office. It is all very well to say they are open during the day when you can get the stamps you may need by night, but it is the experience of all of us that people are caught out and need stamps in a hurry and when they go to the sub-post office they find it has just closed. These machines could be provided at very little expense for practically all the sub-offices in the suburbs of cities like Cork.

The public telephone facilities at these sub-offices are not adequate. I speak of the Cork area, but I am sure the same obtains for the rest of the country. In very many cases the telephone is not enclosed and there is absolutely no privacy. That privacy to which the public are entitled could be provided at very little expense. Perhaps a greater inconvenience is that these telephones are absolutely no use to the public after six or seven o'clock because the office is closed. These telephones should be placed outside in a kiosk, so as to be available at any time of the day or night whether the office was open or closed.

I join with Deputy McGrath in urging the Minister to ask the Minister for Finance to deal as quickly as possible with the rates of pay that obtain in the various grades in the Post Office. The outdoor staff have secured increases quite recently which were very acceptable and I hope this was an indication of a more humanitarian approach to the wages and salaries problems of the staffs of the Department. I hope the revised arbitration machinery will speed up the solution of the claims in the other grades in the Post Office.

Donnchadh Ó Briain

I was really surprised that there was no protest from the Fine Gael Benches or by Deputy Alfred Byrne that the postal charges introduced in 1953 by Deputy Erskine Childers when he was Minister are still being maintained, in view of the vicious opposition then to his proposals to ensure that the Post Office service would be self-supporting, or as nearly so as possible. Vicious opposition was displayed by the Fine Gael Party and by the satellites supporting them then. The present Minister's own Party, the Labour Party, was not involved in that business. Deputy Norton, who was then speaking as Leader of the Labour Party, agreed with the proposals and agreed that a State service like the Post Office should be run on a self-supporting basis. There was vicious opposition form the Fine Gael Party and others to these increased charges, but I do not hear any protest now that the present Minister does not propose to reduce them and bring them back to what they were prior to 1953.

I would like to see more telephone kiosks provided in the smaller towns serving rural areas, particularly as it is so difficult for people now after a certain hour to get telephone calls through sub-post offices, as the hours of service have been reduced. I think the attitude of the Department towards the installation of these kiosks is hyper-conservative. The more the telephone service is extended the more it would be used by the public. It is an immense boon and the Department should take more chances in the provision of these kiosks. Eventually the kiosks would be used and would pay for themselves. I am particularly interested in more amenities of that sort for the small towns and larger villages serving rural areas. They should have available the same type of telephone service as is available in the larger towns and cities.

If these services were provided, they would be respected. There would be a better sense of civic responsibility towards these structures than is displayed in the bigger areas, particularly in Dublin. I know from personal experience that the condition of several of the kiosks provided in this city is a public disgrace. There is displayed a lack of sense of civic responsibility and there is a display of vandalism in the treatment these kiosks receive in the City of Dublin. I have observed that personally, but I do not think there would be the same lack of civic responsibility in these areas for which I am pleading.

There has been in recent years an immense improvement in the telephone service in the areas with which I am familiar, but there is still room for more improvement. In certain areas it is still difficult to get telephone calls through quickly. In some cases there is a quicker service to Dublin than from one town to another ten miles away. I know there are obstacles and problems still to be solved.

We usually experience the greatest courtesy and assistance from the operators, but now and again there are examples of neglect and discourtesy. I hesitate to refer to this matter and I hesitate to put anybody in the dock, but there is one particular instance I know of that has been reported to me, in the constituency I represent, and if things do not improve there, averse as I would be to doing anything about it, I would find it incumbent on me, in the interests of the public I represent, to report the condition of affairs to the Minister and ask him to have the matter investigated. Generally speaking, there has been a big improvement in recent years in the telephone service. There is much quicker service and far less time trying the patience of the individual who is trying to get a telephone call nowadays, particularly with long-distance calls. That is all to the good.

Those are the only remarks I have to make, but I am particularly interested in the distribution of the telephone service as quickly as possible to applicants from rural areas. The number of people in rural areas who are asking for the telephone is growing. I hope the Department will make a special effort to give priority to applications of that nature, because this is one of the many ways in which conditions can be improved and the facilities and amenities available for people living in the rural areas will be put on a par with those available to their fellow citizens in the larger towns and cities.

Mr. MacCarthy

Whilst I wish to join in the tribute paid by Deputy Donnchadh Ó Briain to the staffs of the various departments of the Post Office and to the improvement of the facilities offered to the public in recent years, I would like to join with him, too, in asking for a speedy extension of the telephone system. I do that because I have been disappointed in very many applications I have made. It should be realised that the demand for a better telephone system is just an ordinary development of progress at the present time, because people require the telephone service in case of sudden illness for medical reasons and I have also known cases where there was a loss of stock owing to the fact that the telephone was not available for veterinary services. All these things are developing in modern life, apart altogether from the requirements of trade and business. I think, therefore, that the demand that has been mentioned by the Lord Mayor of Cork and other speakers here is a very general one. We know that everything cannot be done at once, but at the same time when you find that within five or six miles of big centres these services are not yet extended, there is disappointment.

I raised some time ago the matter that there are no lights in certain kiosks in the Cork suburbs. There is such a kiosk in my neighbourhood— at least one, erected over a lengthy period—and after darkness people have to bring a flashlight or a bicycle lamp or something like that to enable them to use the telephone. Lighting matches or a thing like that in trying to get numbers is not very desirable or efficient, and whatever holds up the matter it is about time that it was remedied.

Mention has been made about stamps after hours. It seems very peculiar to me that if a shop has a stamp licence they can sell stamps as long as the shop is open but if you go into a sub-post office where there is also a shop attached and you require a stamp there you are told that the post office is closed and they will not give you a stamp. If there was no sub-post office at all, only a stamp licence, you could get the stamps. Even if they have automatic stamp machines in the post office a person in some line of business or even a Dáil Deputy himself often does not want merely one stamp. He may want to post 20 or 30 letters, and where is he going to get the small change to enable him to get the stamps from such a machine? He cannot post the letters unless he gets stamps beforehand. Occasions occur when the supply of stamps of that kind is very necessary and they are not readily available.

I would like to join, too, in what has been said about temporary postmen, the routes they are on and the service they give. I know a temporary postman who recently retired after a life of service and he was never put on the established list. The reason was that during the trouble a big house occupied by a naval or a military officer of a foreign force happened to be burnt down and it cut 20 minutes off his route. By reason of that he never had enough time afterwards to give him the qualifications for establishment. These small little minor things should not come into the reckoning, and if a man is employed giving service recognition should be given for it and a proper rate should be apportioned to the post rather than to the time he is at it. Somebody goes around and checks up the time, and the pay used to be, at any rate, dependent upon the amount of time that was expended on the work. When a man went on a bit in life and his years of cycling had passed there was no recognition at all for the fact that he had to take a pony or some vehicle of that kind in order to carry out his work in difficult areas.

The service, I know, is improving, and I know that the Minister and his staff are anxious to bring that service up in every way in efficiency and in pay with every other Government and public service. I am not calling attention to these matters for the purpose of criticism but so that they may be remedied. I do not know what the fault is that in certain cases they have not already been remedied. To put a light into a kiosk does not seem a very difficult thing. It does not seem very difficult to give permission to people in a sub-post office to sell stamps on a special licence or otherwise after hours. If they had a special licence as well as the ordinary person who has no sub-post office they would be able to supply the stamps as long as the post offices are open.

These are minor points, if you like, but the extension of the telephone system would be a great boon to the public and I think it would be a paying service.

Notice taken that 20 Deputies were not present; House counted, and 20 Deputies being present,

Mr. Allen

There are a few matters in connection with the Estimate which I would like to bring to the attention of the Minister. One is the delay which occurs in the postal service as between the City of Dublin and the rural areas I represent. The County Wexford is not very far from the City of Dublin, and yet the fact is that if letters are not posted in Dublin before 4 o'clock in the afternoon they are not delivered for two days in the rural parts of that county. They are delivered in the towns on the following morning, where there is a second delivery.

Mr. Deering

With regard to what Deputy Allen has said, I posted a letter in Arklow——

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Allen is in possession and Deputy Deering may not interrupt. If the Deputy wants to make a speech he will have an opportunity of doing so later.

Mr. Allen

It is true to say that 20 years ago there was a more up-to-date delivery of letters in the country areas than there is to-day. That may seem extraordinary, but nevertheless it is a fact. I suggest to the Minister that he should check up on that. Letters which are posted in Dublin before 4 o'clock in the afternoon come down to the country on the night mail and are available for the postmen when leaving the local offices generally about 8 o'clock in the morning. The letters are then delivered to the people in the rural areas. Letters, however, which are not posted in Dublin before 4 o'clock in the afternoon are not brought to the country until the following morning. They arrive by the morning train and by the time it reaches the local towns the postmen on the rural deliveries have already left their offices.

I want to put it to the Minister that this is a serious matter. I have heard numerous complaints about it during the last few years. I suggest to him that it is something that should not happen. There is no reason why the Post Office, with the perfect organisation which is available to it, could not speed up the dispatch of letters posted in Dublin up to 6 o'clock and intended for delivery in the rural areas. I imagine a letter will reach London much more quickly than it will reach some Irish town situate 60 miles away from the City of Dublin. I think it would be well if the Minister would instruct all the post offices throughout the country to check up on this matter. The Post Office has a very perfect organisation and, in my opinion, the people who live in the rural areas are entitled to as up-to-date a service as those who live in the towns. But for the fact that there is a second delivery in the towns the same complaint would arise there as the one I have mentioned in connection with the rural areas.

I am suggesting to the Minister that letters which are posted in Dublin up to 6 or 7 o'clock in the evening should be brought to the country towns in time so that the postmen attached to the local offices will be able to take them for delivery in the country when leaving their offices at 8 o'clock or so in the morning. My friend from the County Wicklow would appear not to have had the same experience as we have, but he is living in a more——

Mr. Deering

Come on with it. Let us have the word.

Mr. Allen

——civilised part of the country.

Mr. Deering

Quite.

Mr. Allen

We will put it that way. He probably gets his post much more quickly than the people I am speaking for. Speaking generally on the Vote, I have no complaint to make with regard to the Post Office service. I think it is a first-class one, well run and highly organised, and I do not think anyone could find fault with it. The anomaly that I have referred to has arisen from probably over-efficiency, if one cares to put it that way. That is quite possible. I could mention the names of many parishes in my constituency to the Minister where it actually happens that three days elapse in the case of letters posted in Dublin before they reach parts of our rural areas. I hope the Minister will see to it that there will be an improvement in this direction. I think that all that is needed to correct what I have mentioned is a little bit of reorganisation.

Mr. Keyes

At the outset, I desire to thank the Deputies who have spoken on this Estimate for the many helpful and constructive suggestions which they have made. I want to assure them that, even if I do not reply specifically to each point that was raised by them, all the suggestions they have made have been noted for consideration. I appreciate the manner in which they have brought forward a number of matters in this debate. I am thankful to them for the suggestions which they have made, and I assure them that these will get very careful consideration.

With regard to the point raised by Deputy Childers in connection with savings, I would like to assure him that every conceivable effort is being made to follow on the lines suggested by him for expanding savings. At the moment representatives of the Department of Finance and of the Post Office are engaged in considering every kind of suggestion that may help to speed up that very desirable project. I am not so sure that the idea—although it is under consideration—of separating the savings service from post offices may not be an unmixed blessing. I feel that there may be disadvantages in separating savings offices from post offices. Every consideration will be given the matter and nothing short of wasteful expenditure in boosting savings will prevent the Department from getting publicity for it.

With regard to the question of uniforms, great attention has been paid to the selection of the material for uniforms and the type of uniform. The Department is determined to have the best possible and most attractive uniforms. They will be issued as the House knows on the 1st November. The other point in regard to the preservation of the uniforms is a moot one but every effort is being made to ensure that recipients of uniforms will treat them with the respect that is due to State uniforms. With regard to rural areas, I am rather reminded of what Jack Cruise said one time: "Will he not want one to dig the garden?" Everything possible is being done to ensure that the uniforms, which are very well and wisely chosen, will be treated with respect by recipients.

The reorganisation of the rural postal services is going on as Deputy Childers is aware. It is a slow enough process. It takes a good deal of time and thought to revise all these postmen's routes which must be traversed so as to ascertain where the necessary saving can be made without disruption. I think reasonably good progress has been made. A number of areas have already been covered and the process goes on, perhaps, not as fast as we would like but I would prefer to do it slowly and do a decent job than to do a bad job and have to go back over it again. We are doing our best about that and in the course of a couple of years practically the whole country routes will have been revised and be on a more up-to-date basis. That is contributory to the point raised about the improvement of part-time posts. We try to eliminate as far as possible lowly-paid part-time postmen but it will not be possible to eliminate them entirely.

The 1954 Christmas traffic in Dublin reached record proportions. The traffic in the Dublin sorting office during the period increased by 3,250,000 or 15 per cent. on 1953 and the delivered traffic over the Dublin district was up by 800,000. The 21st December was advertised as the latest date for posting local correspondence for Christmas delivery, and generally speaking, with one exception, correspondence posted up to that time, including the 22nd December, was delivered in time. The exception occurred in the case of the Rathmines delivery office, where, on account of the great pressure, it was not possible to keep the traffic in absolute sequence and a relatively small number of items posted on the 21st December was not included in the Christmas deliveries. In comparison with the total involved the number was insignificant. The postal staffs worked untiringly very long hours and in many cases worked 17 hours per day. It is a tribute to their efforts that a vast volume of correspondence was dealt with so successfully.

With regard to the new Dublin sorting office, sketch drawings have been drafted and officers of my Department are visiting the Swiss post office to see the latest mechanised principles in practice there with a view to their application here when the sorting office is in full swing. The project is a long time in train. We do not want to be behind in this regard.

With regard to the question of buildings, design and colouring, we did inherit a good lot of Victorian stuff. It is only natural that we would have inherited that. It is not easy to shake ourselves loose of that but I think we are making some progress. The Board of Works do very decent work and in the course of the next few years a number of their buildings will be finished and I feel confident they will be a credit to the Board of Works engineers and architects. There are certain fundamentals in regard to the building of a post office which one must have regard to. The architects and the engineers do their very best to work in co-operation with us in order to give us a decent job.

A few points were raised with which I cannot very well deal in connection with the wage rates of some of the grades. At the moment the rates in connection with the grades referred to by Deputies Childers, Casey and MacGrath are the subject of negotiaation through conciliation and arbitration machinery and it would not be proper to discuss them at all. I do not want to be saying too much but I think that, generally speaking, the unions are doing a good job. I am glad to see them doing a good job. They are fighting hard.

The question of the business reply service was raised and it was said that that facility was not as well known as it should be. There is an amazing growth having regard to the short time it is in operation. A licence is necessary for it and licence applications are coming in nice and steadily. That in itself should be the best advertisement for it. It will grow like a repeating decimal. It is certainly growing in popularity.

Reference was made to the question of stamp designs. In that connection, I should like to say that the Department are very particular about the design. They might not have been in years past but they are getting very squeamish about designs and their aim is to get the most artistic design. There is definitely a determination to secure the most artistic stamp. It is only fitting and right, if we go to the expense of issuing a stamp, that we should have something to be proud of. The Department is not so sure that we will be able to recover on the cost of production by philatelic sales but that is not here or there. We do the best we can. We want to try and get the best possible stamp and the most artistic stamp. If we cannot recover on the cost of production by these sales we have got to put up with it.

On the question of the full-time temporary postman, the position is that the Department will recognise any full-time post regularly required as justifying the creation of an established and pensionable post. This is done to the utmost extent practicable and the Department is always willing to listen to representations in the matter. We feel that the appointment from temporary to permanent positions is to be encouraged wherever possible.

Mr. McGrath

Would the Minister think that a man doing the job for 20 years should have to undergo an examination?

Mr. Keyes

This is the point about temporary employees being appointed to permanent posts. Examinations for establishment are held from time to time and these temporary employees get priority in becoming established. That is the point I am making.

Mr. McGrath

I do not think these people should be asked to undergo an examination after 20 years' service.

Mr. Keyes

I will deal with the points made by Deputy McGrath in a moment. In connection with contracts for cabling, Deputy Childers regretted that there was not more progress made. I can assure the Deputy and the House that tenders are actually coming in and a decision will be taken by the end of this month. As a matter of fact we had some difficulty in getting tenders of the type we wanted. However, we have got them now; they are actually in and they are being considered and inside a month a decision will be taken on them.

The question of the mechanisation of postal services was raised. That could be a very thorny matter. I think there is a limit to the extent to which such services could be utilised. We might have a very serious reaction from the staffs themselves. There may be cases where mechanisation could be utilised, but I would not think a general utilisation of motor cycle deliveries would be desirable. I would like to have more concrete evidence, first of all, that the utilisation of such services would not have a bad reaction on the staff. The staff at the moment is fairly content and they are doing their job in a decent way. In so far as mechanisation is concerned possibilities are, of course, limited. We might utilise it but not in a very general way, because the possibility is that its use might be outweighed by the adverse reactions it might have.

Reference was made to the mechanisation of telephone accounting. For some years the Department has been experimenting with punched-card accounting machinery for trunk ticket sorting and listing. Within the limited field covered the experiment was successful. Recently, however, the possibilities of mechanising the whole telephone accounting system have been examined and it was found that a slight extension of the sorting work hitherto done at large local exchanges with mechanisation of accounting work after the sorting stage by simple, inexpensive adding-listing machines proved far cheaper and more flexible than the overall mechanisation on a punched-card basis. The punched-card machinery has accordingly been dispensed with and the new mechanised system will be in operation within the next few months. It is a very satisfactory and up-to-date method.

With regard to the salaries of the engineering staffs and sorting assistants, that comes into the same category as the investigations to which I have already referred. The conciliation and arbitration machinery is available to the staff. The unions are doing a very good job. I know that as a result of some experience I have had with the unions myself they are very tough men to overcome. I think conciliation and arbitration is a very satisfactory machine and all the staffs seem to be very pleased with it indeed. If there is any complaint it is in relation to its slowness of operation. However, I think it is a very good machine and so far it has proved to be the best. The scheme is still in its infancy and we are hoping that, as time goes on, any defects will be remedied. The question of greeting telegrams has been considered and will be dealt with in the White Paper. The telegraph committee has dealt with that matter.

With regard to the salaries of clerks, postal clerks and telephonists, these are all the subject of negotiations under the conciliation and arbitration scheme at present and the claims are all more or less sub judice at the moment. Deputy McGrath referred to the lower grades. All these are being dealt with at the moment by the unions. The machinery is there now and if there are any ill-paid grades the machinery is there to bring the claim forward. I do not know that any grades have been left out of these negotiations. The general service grades naturally come within the scope of the General Conciliation Council and their claims go forward with those of the other Departments. Post office clerks and postmen, etc., are dealt with by conciliation and arbitration. They are using that machinery very effectively and I hope they will continue to do so.

The decision to divert a ship from Cork to Dublin, which was referred to by Deputy McGrath, was not taken by the Post Office. It was taken by the shipping company.

Mr. McGrath

I said that. The shipping company said they had a cargo coming to Dublin and that was the reason for their bringing the mails to Dublin. I think the Minister should have insisted on the mails being landed at Cobh and not have them sent up to Dublin, where there was a long delay in sorting, and then sending them back again to Cork.

Mr. Keyes

I do not think we had much control in the matter. Unless we get our own fleet we cannot exercise any control. We will bring them up the Shannon! With regard to the point made of establishing officials in their own towns or as near as possible to their own towns, the method obtaining at the moment is that anybody anxious for transfer to his own native town, or indeed to any particular town, is listed in the order of application and is transferred in that order. I have had no representations about changing the present method which seems to work out quite satisfactorily.

Mr. McGrath

By the time his turn comes, a man has settled down in Dublin and got married.

Mr. Keyes

That is a different point. In many such cases the officer entered specially for a particular Dublin examination. Then when they come up here, they get sorry and want to go back again to the country.

A question was raised as to there being no lights in certain telephone kiosks. In passing, let me say that it is our intention to erect kiosks in every new housing scheme where there is any reasonable hope that they will pay their way. But there should be lights in every kiosk and if Deputies know of any that are not lit I would be glad to be informed of them. As a matter of fact I intend to have the matter investigated because that should not happen.

Mr. McGrath

There is one a few yards from my own house.

Mr. MacCarthy

There is another a quarter of a mile from my house.

Mr. McGrath

There has been no light in that kiosk for the past 12 months.

Mr. Keyes

With regard to the absence of cabinets in some sub-post offices, we have extended the telephone service to practically all sub-offices. That took a bit of doing and if we put a telephone cabinet in each and every one it will entail quite a considerable cost. I think it is something that should be done by stages. It is not desirable that one should have to use a telephone in a post office without any privacy of any kind. I think we will possibly be able to devise a cheap type of cabinet, but that will take some time. We will get on with the job as fast as we can.

Deputy Casey referred to the question of staff conditions. I have already covered that point two or three times. The staffs have the arbitration and conciliatory machinery. Cases not proper to that scheme have direct access to the Department and can raise such matters. Every grade is provided for from the lowest to the highest. Everything can be discussed between the unions and the Department. I am satisfied that this machinery is working very satisfactorily and I hope that it will be speeded up. I will do everything possible to try and speed that up because I am glad to see workers and the representatives of the Departments sitting down to discuss in a friendly atmosphere problems which might otherwise lead to friction and trouble.

In conclusion, I want to say how grateful I am to Deputies for the reception they gave to my Estimate, and particularly to Deputy Childers who has given me so much assistance especially in regard to the proposals with reference to the telegraph charges.

Mr. O'Leary

The Minister did not mention anything at all about the employment of foreign musicians.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

That will come with the next Estimate.

Vote put and agreed to.