I move:
That a sum not exceeding £8,227,080 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, 1963, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Office of the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs and of certain other Services administered by that Office, and for payment of Grants-in-Aid.
The net Estimate for my Department amounts to £12,905,080, the gross Estimate being reduced by appropriations-in-aid totalling £4,353,571. As shown in the Estimate volume, that is an increase of £1,746,580 over 1961/62. An additional provision of £460,000 for my Department in February last in the global Vote for Increases in Remuneration has, however, to be taken into account also, and the actual net increase is, therefore, £1,286,580. As increases in the grants-in-aid to Radio Éireann, made up largely of increased licence fee revenue for transfer to the Authority, amount to £238,600, the increase in the net provision for the services directly provided by my Department is £1,047,980. This is attributable mainly to increased staff costs and to the continuing expansion of the telephone service.
The following subheads contain substantial variations:
In regard to Subhead A—Salaries, Wages and Allowances—the Estimate Volume shows an increase of approximately £1,245,000, but to this year's provision must be added the additional £460,000 granted, since the Volume was prepared, to meet increases in remuneration in 1961/62. The actual increase is, therefore, £785,000, and is due mainly to having to meet the cost for a whole year of the increases in remuneration. In addition, provision has been made for additional engineering workmen for the expanded construction programme, and for maintenance requirements which grow as the system expands, and for additional telephonists.
Under Subhead C—Accommodation and Building Charges—there is an increase of £50,000 which is mainly due to the requirements of telephone development: £40,000 being for the acquisition of sites and buildings and £7,000 for rent for storage of poles.
In subhead F—Engineering Stores and Equipment—the major portion of the increase of £979,000 is to meet the requirements of the expanded telephone construction programme both for the direct purchase of stores and for payments to contractors. As in the case of the telephone buildings provided for in the previous subhead, expenditure on telephone construction is treated as a capital charge and recovered from Telephone Capital funds by way of appropriations-in-aid. Incidentally, Deputies will probably have noticed that expenditure on equipment for civil aviation and meteorological wireless services has been transferred to the Vote for Transport and Power, where it is fitted into the general picture of airports expenditure.
In subhead G—Telephone Capital Repayments—the increase of practically £177,000 in the annuities which repay to the Central Fund the capital advanced for the development of the telephone service is a consequence of continuing heavy investment.
Subhead K.1—Grant Equivalent to Net Receipts from Broadcasting Licence Fees (Grant-In-Aid)—provides a grant-in-aid for the transfer to Radio Éireann the net revenue from television and sound receiving licence fees. The increase of £222,000 is to provide for the yield from a larger number of television licence fees and from the application of the increased sound licence fee over a whole year.
In subhead T—Appropriations-In-Aid—the increase of slightly over a million pounds is almost entirely due to an increase of £1,000,000 in the amount to be recovered from Telephone Capital funds in respect of the telephone development programme.
In comparison with the previous year, combined letter and parcel postings rose by about 16 million or 5 per cent. Christmas traffic set a record. The railway strike at Cork and other southern stations seriously dislocated postal services in November and early December. Parcel post had to be partially curtailed but the letter services were maintained, though with difficulty, by means of the Department's own transport.
I mentioned this time last year that the new postal address numbering scheme for Dublin had got off to an encouraging start. I am glad to say that it has continued to make good progress. By now 46 per cent of mail posted in Dublin for delivery there bears the district number and the overall figure for local, domestic and foreign mail delivered there is 42 per cent. The percentage is rising steadily from month to month, fresh publicity appeals are planned and, judging from the generous initial response given by the public, the success of the numbering scheme seems assured. It is important that it should succeed, for use of the appropriate district number simplifies sorting and reduces the risk of delay to mail.
Through its membership of the Universal Postal Union, the Department keeps itself informed of experiments and developments in the mechanisation of mail handling undertaken by other postal administrations; normally it is not in a position to conduct independent research in this field.
I am, however, glad to be able to mention one modest achievement of our own. A machine for date stamping packets was invented by a member of the engineering staff and an experimental model was produced in the Department's own factory. The machine is being tried out, under actual working conditions, in the Dublin letter office and, so far, its performance has been very satisfactory.
On the foreign side, the outward traffic, particularly parcels, continued to show a healthy trend. Air mail parcels increased by 32 per cent, and the total for both air and surface parcels went up by 19 per cent.
Two special postage stamps were issued in 1961 to commemorate the Patrician Year and the 25th Anniversary of the founding of Aer Lingus. This year, in addition to the one in honour of John O'Donovan and Eugene O'Curry, we will join with other members of the European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations in the issue, in September, of a special stamp of a common design sponsored by that body.
Telegraph and telex services followed the pattern of recent years. The estimated total number of telegrams handled during the year ending 31st March, 1962, is approximately 1,764,000 which is a drop of one per cent, on the number for the previous year.
The telex service, which is now over six years old, continues to develop. The number of subscribers is now 157 compared with 140 last year and the number of messages is increasing steadily; last year there were well over 300,000 telex messages. The conversion of the system to automatic working, which I referred to last year, is expected to be completed about mid-1963. This will make the service even more attractive for subscribers as they will be able to dial direct any other telex subscribers in these islands and also subscribers in many Continental countries. Under the automatic system, sub-exchanges will be set up at Cork and Shannon Airport and eventually, perhaps, at other places depending on developments.
It is expected that the loss on the telegraph service will amount to about £135,000 during 1961/62 or approximately the same as for the previous three years. Costs have, however, increased as a result of recent pay awards and an increase in the loss for the coming year is inevitable.
The telephone service continued to grow in 1961. Call traffic increased by 9 per cent. approximately to 158.5 million, comprising some 144 million local and 14.5 million trunk calls.
The trunk mileage added to the system was 18,400 miles, an increase of over 50 per cent. on the figure for 1960. The additional circuits were provided mostly in underground and aerial cables and in the form of microwave radio circuits.
The number of subscribers' exchange lines provided was 14,500 approximately as compared with 15,300 in the previous year; one large and 11 small automatic exchanges were opened; the equipment at 163 exchanges was extended and 80 extra telephone kiosks were provided.
An important development during the year was the extension of subscriber trunk dialling to the major automatic exchanges. All subscribers, apart from those with coin box installations, in the Athlone, Cork, Drogheda, Dublin, Dundalk, Galway, Limerick, Mullingar, Naas, Sligo and Waterford automatic areas comprising approximately 65 per cent. of the total number, can now dial calls to one another. Similar facilities will be provided at most of the other automatic exchanges within the next two years or so and will normally be incorporated from the start in all new automatic exchanges.
The equipment for the conversion of some 60 exchanges to automatic working in the Balbriggan, Ballyshannon, Croom, Curragh Camp, Kildare, Kinsale, Midleton, New Ross Roscommon and Tuam areas has been delivered and the work of installation will now be carried out as rapidly as possible. Contracts have been placed for automatic equipment for some 20 other areas comprising about 90 exchanges including An Uaimh, Arklow, Athy, Bandon, Mallow, Portlaoise, Shannon Airport, Tullamore and Wicklow. Completion of some of these schemes may, however, take up to three years.
During the year trunk circuits were provided on radio links between Athlone and Galway and between Sligo and Donegal. A microwave circuit will shortly be brought into service between Dublin and Arklow. Completion of the microwave link between Waterford, Wexford and Enniscorthy has, unfortunately, been delayed and is now expected early next year. A contract has recently been placed for a microwave system between Tralee and Limerick as part of a major scheme to link Killarney, Tralee, Listowel and a number of places in County Limerick with the main cable network at Limerick. Another contract covers the provision of a microwave link between Limerick and Athlone. A new trunk cable from Cork to Fermoy is now in service; others in the Midleton and Mallow areas have been completed and others elsewhere are either in progress or in various preparatory stages. These include Cork and Macroom, Waterford and Clonmel—due for completion this year—and links between Carlow and Portlaoise, Letterkenny and Lifford, Letterkenny and the Inishowen Peninsula which are due to be started this year. In addition, substantial numbers of extra circuits will be provided by means of carrier equipment on open wire routes and by fitting additional equipment on the coaxial cables; aerial cabling will be erected on over 50 routes and some hundreds of miles of open wire will be provided on various minor routes.
Forty-eight additional circuits were provided to Great Britain via Belfast during 1961 and it is hoped to provide a similar number early next year. The question of providing additional direct circuits on a large scale—either by another submarine cable or a high capacity microwave link—is still being considered.
The special television microwave link between Kippure and the studios at Montrose was also provided for Radio Éireann by my Department; we expect to complete the other links required to feed programmes to the four provincial transmitters later in the year.
I mentioned last year that some reduction in the rate of connection of new telephones and a consequential increase in the waiting list could hardly be avoided because of the need to devote a greater proportion of our resources to trunk and exchange development. In the event, as I have indicated above, the number of new connections was lower and the mileage of additional trunk circuits substantially higher last year than in 1960. The rate of connection of new subscribers was also affected by shortages of underground plant in cities and towns and of subscribers' equipment at some exchanges. It was also adversely affected by storm damage in the latter months of the year.
The waiting list has now risen to 10,000 and, while I would like to announce that it will not increase further, I am afraid we must, in the interests of subscribers generally, continue for some time to concentrate our efforts on improvement of the trunk and exchange services. This is necessary because delays and difficulties in connecting calls in the conditions in which the service is now operated can have a kind of snowball effect and throw unmanageable loads on exchanges—automatic as well as manual. This increases the delay in answering subsequent callers and produces poor service generally. Some exchanges experienced such conditions during peak traffic periods last year.
The fact is, of course, that the telephone service is a highly integrated one and the intake of new subscribers cannot with safety be greatly increased without a corresponding expansion in the capacity of the system as a whole. Ideally, the latter should come first in anticipation of demand. In recent years the connection rate has increased much faster than it has been possible to expand the trunk and exchange systems, particularly as we have had a great volume of arrears to be made good not only in local cabling schemes but in the form of more expensive schemes which were deferred in the past to conserve capital and are now urgent. The trouble is to get more than a few such schemes started at the same time. I have already referred to some such schemes which are now under way; others are in various stages of planning.
Unfortunately, the implementation of major schemes involves the acquisition of sites, the erection of new buildings etc., and, in general, is a lengthy process. There are long delays too in getting delivery of most kinds of telecommunication equipment owing to expansion of world demand in this field. I hope, however, that sufficient progress will have been made in providing additional trunk and exchange equipment by the end of this year to enable the rate of connecting new telephones to be stepped up. In the meantime we will, of course, continue to meet applications for telephones in the priority categories and a substantial part of ordinary demand.
In the light of what I have said, Deputies will understand that the capital requirements of the telephone service are heavy and are likely to become heavier. I have persuaded the Minister for Finance to let me have a capital provision of £3.5 million for 1962/63 as compared with £2.5 million for 1961-62 and an average of well under £2 million in previous years. About half the £3.5 million is intended for trunk and exchange schemes and the other half for subscribers' and renters' circuits, subscribers' underground plant, etc.
Business in the Post Office Savings Bank continues to increase. At the 31st December, 1961, the total balance, including interest, due to depositors was approximately £91.5 millions as compared with £86.7 millions at the end of the previous year.
Deposits during the year amounted to £19.2 millions, and withdrawals, to £16.6 millions, representing increases of slightly over one million pounds, and over half a million pounds, respectively, compared with the preceding year. About £1.5 millions of the withdrawals were for re-investment in Exchequer Stock, Savings Certificates or Prize Bonds.
Deposits and withdrawals by the Trustee Savings Banks during the year amounted to approximately £1.34 millions and £.67 millions respectively and were roughly the same as in the preceding year. The total amount, including interest, to the credit of the Trustee Banks at the end of the year was £16 millions, an increase of rather more than a million pounds.
The mechanisation of Savings Bank headquarters accounting was successfully completed during the year. In addition to improving the service to depositors, the change-over has produced savings, allowing for cost of the equipment, of about £50,000 a year.
Sales of Savings Certificates for 1961 amounted to £3.5 millions and repayments, including interest, to £2.48 millions—a slight increase in each case over the previous year. The net accretion for the year was about £1 million. Approximately £150,000 of the repayments were re-investment in Exchequer Stock or Prize Bonds.
Post Offices throughout the country continued to co-operate in the issue of Prize Bonds and approximately £8 millions of the £26 millions of Prize Bonds issued to date were collected through Post Offices.
I should like to take this opportunity of saying that I believe that the continuing increase in savings, with all that means both for individuals and the community, is due to a considerable extent to the publicity and organising work done by the Savings Committee. The members deserve our best thanks for their efforts.
The Department's remittance services continued to be widely used for the transfer of funds. The total value of money orders and postal orders issued in 1961 was £22.6 millions, an increase of about half a million pounds over the preceding year. The number of orders issued was 10.3 millions, a reduction of over 100,000 on the previous year, and accordingly, the average value of both money orders and postal orders increased. This development is a welcome one from the Department's point of view since it tends to reduce handling charges, and obviously it also meets the requirements of the public. It arises, at least in part, from the greater use of the higher value money orders and postal orders introduced two years ago.
Social Welfare and related payments totalled £29.5 millions, an increase of over £2.5 millions on the preceding year.
During 1961, seven new automatic telephone exchange buildings and one new automanual exchange building were erected. A new public office was provided at Shannon Airport and improvements were made to Gorey post office and to the public office at Mallow. Work was under way on the building of a new post office at Wicklow, on the erection of six other automatic exchange buildings, and on major improvements to Carrick-on-Shannon, Ennis, Killarney and Wexford post offices.
This year work has already started on one new automatic exchange building and on a major scheme of improvements at Sligo post office. It is expected that within a few months work will commence on new post office buildings at Ballinasloe and Youghal and on a further eight telephone exchanges. Other major projects which are also expected to start this year are a new trunk exchange for Dublin, a new district sorting office at Finglas, and improvements at Limerick post office.
As regards the proposed new central sorting office for Dublin a contract for the structural steel-work has been placed and tenders have been invited for site clearance and foundation works. It is expected that the foundation and steel erection work will have been completed and the main building work started by the end of the year 1962-63.
The number of staff provided for in the Estimate is 17,066 an increase of 487 over last year's figure. The bulk of this additional staff comprises engineering workmen and telephone operating force required to cater for the continuing growth and expansion of the telephone system.
As I mentioned earlier, the provision for salaries and wages shows an increase of £1,244,700 as compared with last year. Roughly £1,100,000 of this is attributable to the pay increases. The vast majority of post office staff come within the scope of the Conciliation and Arbitration Scheme for the Civil Service and claims on behalf of all the Departmental grades within the scheme were dealt with during the year. I am happy to say that the majority of the claims, representing over 90 per cent of the staff, were settled by agreement.
During the past year, too, claims for reductions in weekly hours of work were conceded for a number of grades, principally engineering workmen, post office clerks and telephonists and these reductions were applied as far as possible towards giving the staff concerned a half-day weekly or a day-off per fortnight. It is, however, necessary to recruit additional staff to cater for the reduced output resulting from the shorter working week and approximately 60 of the 487 additional staff mentioned earlier are attributable to this.
The Department is keenly conscious of the need to keep its costs as low as possible by good organisational practices. Methods, techniques and staffing in every branch of its activities are subject to continuous review. The Department pioneered Organisations and Methods—O. & M. as it is called —in the Civil Service and having proved its value, applied it all through its clerical operational and technical work. To take some instances: the Accountant's Branch present staff of 694 is 35 heads fewer than in 1948 although in the interval the number of telephone accounts has trebled, and there has been a big increase in Savings Bank work and in the scale of the Department's activities. This impressive rise in productivity has been achieved by mechanisation and by streamlining accounting.
The telegraph service has been completely reorganised—morse has been eliminated and replaced by combined telephone-teleprinter transmission of messages. This reorganisation, together with the fall in traffic, has reduced the staff employed on telegraphs by nearly 500 heads. Since 1948 the total number of telephones has been nearly trebled and the number of new lines provided each year has increased by almost 150 per cent. The total number of engineering staff, on the other hand, has increased by only 83 per cent.
On the postal side, sorting office fittings have been modernised, mail circulation arrangements revised and mechanical aids installed wherever they would be economic; the entire rural services have been reorganised, a twelve year task which has given a better all round standard of service and a six-day frequency of service throughout the mainland. The postman force is actually less now than it was in 1948 although (1) the volume of mail delivered is 26 per cent. greater (2) a 6-day frequency of delivery is afforded on 1,100 posts which in 1948 operated on three, four or five days a week only and (3) the sprawling growth of Dublin and housing development in some of the major provincial cities have significantly added to the distance to be travelled by postmen.
It can truly be claimed that the Post Office has made notable progress in attaining greater productivity. To all grades of the staff, from the lowest to the highest, I express my thanks for their efficient and zealous service throughout the year.
The pay increases and reductions in working hours I have been talking about have had a very significant effect on the Department's financial position. The addition of over a million pounds a year to the wages bill is by far the largest increase in the Department's history. It cannot be offset by the normal growth in traffic which can be handled without a proportionate increase in staff or by any foreseeable improvement in organisation or in techniques. Neither can the situation be met by reducing services or facilities available at Post offices —these are at the lowest reasonable level already. So money must be found to meet the increased costs. And it can be found only by increasing charges or by a subvention from the taxpayer. I have chosen to obtain it in the first of these ways—the choice which any Minister for Posts and Telegraphs would, I think, make.
The Department is a quasi-commercial organisation rendering services to its customers in return for payment, and while it must carry some uneconomic services for social reasons, such as the telegraph service at present, it should in the sum of its activities and taking one year with another, earn sufficient to pay its way.
I may perhaps say that over its whole life so far and over the past ten years, it has just fallen short of achieving that. As Deputies can see from Appendix E on page 260 of the Estimates volume which shows the trading results of the Department on a commercial account basis, the Department has earned a small surplus in each of the past five years. In 1960/61, the last completed year, the surplus of £368,000, represented a margin of about four per cent. on the Department's expenditure. The surpluses in the past five years were quite insufficient to wipe out the deficits in the previous five years, and over the ten years period, the loss on the Department's services has amounted to almost £1 million.
In the current year, the surplus is expected to be of the order of £200,000. Next year, however, the increase of £1 million in wage costs would produce a deficit of about £360,000, after allowing for the need to make adequate provision for pension liability and telephone plant depreciation. Accordingly, it was decided to introduce increases in charges, calculated to yield a small surplus of about £300,000. As expenditure, on a commercial account basis, will run to £11 to £12 million, the margin of surplus proposed is only of the order of 3 per cent. That is a very small provision against such contingencies as rises in costs, other than staff costs, when the full effect of increased wages in transport and manufacture is felt, or an unforeseen drop in revenue, and will put the Department back into the position it has been in during the last few years.
The increases decided upon have already been publicised. As regards the raising of the minimum letter rate to 4d. I would like to emphasise that no other postal rate is being changed, that it is only the minimum rate which is being increased to 4d. and that letters above the minimum weight will cost no more than before and that finally the new rate will not be out of line with rates in European countries generally. On the telephone side, the main increase is the raising of subscribers' exchange line rentals by £1 10s. a year. While this may appear large and unreasonable to persons who will object to increases of any kind, I should like to point out that our exchange line rentals have not been raised since 1953 and that certain reductions were granted in 1959. Moreover, the increased rentals will still be well below the average annual cost to the Department per line in respect of interest, maintenance and provision for depreciation, which we estimate as being about £14 a year but we have not been getting this return from a large proportion of lines even when call revenue from both local and trunk calls in each case is added to the rental. This is a matter of some importance when one considers that the level of rentals affects the demand for new telephones and indirectly the total demand for capital.
As has already been announced the new postage rates will operate towards the end of April and the new telephone charges from the beginning of July.
As Deputies are aware, Radio Éireann derives its income from two main sources: from the net proceeds of licence fees, which can be made available only by vote of this House, and from receipts in respect of advertisements, and it is under a statutory obligation so to conduct its affairs that it will become self-supporting as soon as possible.
My functions regarding the broadcasting and television services are limited to certain matters specified in the Broadcasting Authority Act, 1960. I have no responsibility for the programmes or for the ordinary day-to-day administration of the services provided by Radio Éireann. I do not, therefore, propose to report in detail on Radio Éireann's activities during the past year, particularly as Radio Éireann is obliged to furnish annual reports and accounts which must be laid before each House of the Oireachtas. There was some unavoidable delay in preparing the first report and accounts for the 10 months ended 31st March, 1961, and they will be presented shortly, but I have been assured that a similar delay will not arise in the presentation of the report and accounts for the year ending 31st March, 1962.
The commencement of the television service from the Kippure transmitter on New Year's Eve last was by far the most important development during the past year. This was a very big undertaking and the service is being provided under very great difficulties. For example, only a portion of the building at Montrose is occupied, staff and resources are scattered over a number of premises, the staff lack experience and have to make do with temporary facilities. However, these disabilities have been overcome by great enthusiasm and effort from the staff, and the public response has been gratifying.
With my approval, the Authority fixed the weekly hours for television broadcasting at 42 per week, with permission to go as high as 47 hours per week. With my approval also, the Authority fixed the total daily time for broadcasting television advertisements at ten per cent. of programme time, subject to a maximum of seven and a half minutes in any one hour. These arrangements will be subject to review from time to time.
At the moment, over 20 hours per week of the total of about 44 hours devoted to television broadcasting represents home-originated programmes. That is a much higher proportion of home-originated programmes than was originally thought possible and is a considerable achievement for any television service, particularly for the television service of a small country. Whether the Authority will be able to maintain the present volume of home output is a matter that it will only be possible to decide in the light of experience. It goes without saying that home-produced programmes cost much more than imported films and recorded programmes.
There has been considerable interest in the television service as an advertising medium and the initial volume-of advertisements placed with the Authority has been satisfactory. It is too early yet to make any definite predictions of television income and expenditure for 1962/63 but it is the Authority's objective to provide as good a service as it can, consistent with its obligations and capacity, and to extend the service to the whole country as quickly as possible.
The Authority has not yet determined in what order the provincial transmitters at Truskmore, Maghera, Mount Leinster and Mullaghanish will be brought into operation. A lot will depend on such factors as the delivery dates of the necessary equipment, which is on order, and the dates of completion of the northern and southern radio links which will carry the programmes from Kippure to the other transmitters and are being provided on a rental basis by my Department. These links are due to be completed late this year and the Authority hopes that by the end of the year viewers in practically all parts of the country will be able to receive the Telefís Éireann programmes.
The present transmissions from Kippure are on 405 lines, the standard at present in use in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. As I announced on 18th August last, the Irish Television service will operate on a national standard of 625 lines using 8-megacycle channels with frequency modulated sound and negative picture modulation. It will be similar to the Western European standard except that it will use a wider vision band and so give an even better picture than the general European system. There will, however, be dual transmissions from Kippure and Truskmore on 405 and 625 lines.
This arrangement will be subject to review, but existing and prospective owners of 405 line sets in the areas to be served by the Dublin and Sligo transmitters are assured that 405 line transmitters will not be ceased without many years' notice being given to avoid premature obsolescence of such sets. Prospective purchasers of 405 line receivers outside the normal service area of the Dublin and Sligo 405 line transmitters should satisfy themselves about the quality of service they will obtain before purchasing receivers which are designed to receive 405 line transmissions only.
Since 1st January, 1962 holders of television sets require a special licence which costs £4 and covers sound as well as television. Some viewers were rather slow about taking out licences, and towards the end of February, my Department instituted an intensive drive against holders of unlicensed sets. The drive has been very successful and it is expected that the number of television licences in force will be of the order of 100,000 by 31st March, 1962.
I said last year that I had urged the Authority to give special attention to the problem of poor reception of the Athlone transmissions in certain parts of the country and that there had been discussions between technical officers of the Authority and of my Department but that no solution had been reached. During the year, the Authority necessarily gave priority to the establishment and extension of the television service but this particular problem has not been forgotten. Within the past few months some experimental work has been done on it and a modification of the earth system at Athlone has effected an all round improvement in the coverage of the Athlone transmitter. This improvement has been most marked in the sector north-east to south-east. The question of whether the coverage can be further improved in areas where reception is still poor is being studied.
During the year I consented to the Authority's decision to publish an official programme journal. The first issue of the journal—the RTV Guide— which is a valuable aid to selective listening and viewing appeared on 1st December, 1961.
When speaking on the Supplementary Estimate in November last I referred to the work of the Interference Advisory Committee which has been established under the Broadcasting Authority Act, 1960. I am glad to say that the first set of draft regulations based on the committee's recommendations will shortly be on sale. The regulations will deal with interference caused by small electric motors—one of the principal causes of interference. It is the intention that the regulations shall apply not alone to users of electric motors but to manufacturers, assemblers, traders and importers of such motors for sale or hire in the State. During a period of two months interested parties may make representations to my Department suggesting variations of the draft.
The committee is now studying interference caused by internal combustion engines and by industrial, scientific and medical apparatus. As it is simply not practicable to avoid all interference, the committee can only recommend steps which will have the effect of bringing interference within tolerable limits. As I said before, the problem is so extensive that progress will necessarily be slow.
