I think I can safely say that most sections of the community will be shocked to hear that it is proposedto increase the postage, the rate of telegrams and the cost of telephones. Coming so shortly after we had hoped that a final adjustment had been made, the effect of this on the ordinary member of the community will be to take a little more from the very little he has in order to balance his budget. I should say that it will not be any great help to the Save your Money campaign that the Minister for Posts and Telegraphs has announced and by means of which he hopes to induce people to invest in the Post Office. There are people who were hard put, especially people with small businesses who use the Post Office, the mail, the telegram or the telephone year by year to contact their clients. They will be very hard put now to make ends meet not to speak of putting a little bit away in the Post Office. Certainly the big business people will not be so seriously affected. They will certainly put it down to cost of production and pass it on to the ordinary consumer as an increase that was unavoidable.
I should have expected that the increase in the number of persons using the mail and the telephone would have at least justified a standstill, if not a reduction, in overheads. We all know that wages have to be increased but apparently the Minister is now proposing to recover some of those wage increases by putting up the cost of mails, telegrams and telephones. Might I suggest that he may find he is killing the goose that laid the golden egg and that he will have to finance these increases in some other way?
The last speaker congratulated the Minister on the earlier delivery of mails in Donegal. I would suggest that the Minister would direct his attention to the County Waterford. In my town mails are now being delivered more than an hour and a half later than they were 30 years ago. That is very poor progress and redounds neither to the credit of the present Minister nor that of previous Ministers for Posts and Telegraphs.
While I am speaking on that matter, I might mention that our urban council decided to draw the attention of the Minister's postmasters in the area to that position but they got back whatI would suggest is a sharp critical letter, implying that there was no justification at all for their protest and that rather should they mind their own business. I should not think the Minister would tolerate any of his officers replying to fair criticism of his Department in that manner. We all find it the common experience that if you submit to the postmaster of a town for transmission to his superior officer any comment in the shape of criticism or suggestion you will invariably get a reply denying all responsibility, alleging there was no delay and if there was a delay that it was your fault and not theirs at all. Perhaps, that may be accountable for the fact that the people responsible for what has been complained about are the people who investigate the complaints.
In regard to complaints, I would suggest to the Minister that some independent officer of his who would not take part in any of the blame that might be apportioned should be detailed to investigate the complaint. I would seriously suggest to the Minister that complaints in respect of his Departments, his officials, or of the service they give should be treated in the way a good businessman treats complaints. They should be welcomed as pointing out defects or indicating where better services could be given.
My experience of the Post Office for a number of years, especially since I became a Dáil Deputy, has been that, when you lodge a complaint, you are looked upon as being a person who was offending. Surely the lodging of a complaint is not of itself an offence but something that should be welcomed by the Post Office staff and something that should be investigated and cleared up to the satisfaction, if possible, of the people complaining? Complaints should not be, as I have seen very often, the occasion for offensive replies.
I would agree with many of the speakers who suggested that sub-post-mistresses and sub-postmasters should get an increased allowance. They have to perform responsible work and unfortunately too often we read in the daily newspapers of cases where those unfortunate officials were driven intoerrors that led to the police court. I am suggesting that a good part of this is due to the fact that the money they get is not in proportion to the responsibility of the work they do.
In connection with rural postmen, all I can suggest is that the auxiliary postman as we know him to-day should be dispensed with. He is the man who gets a sum, varying from 30/- to £2, for approximately two or three hours per day for a number of days of the week. He obviously cannot be classified as a full-time employee. Neither can he be classified as an unemployed man. He is neither fish nor flesh and is certainly not good red herring in any shape or form. He is a badly paid worker who has not sufficient work to occupy him fully. I would suggest that an amalgamation of districts should be arranged so that we would have at least a whole-time postman who would do possibly the work of two part-time auxiliary postmen.
Deputy Gallagher referred to the appointment of auxiliary postmen and congratulated the Minister for acting on the advice of his selection committee. I would like to ask the Minister if he invariably makes it a point of accepting the person nominated as the most suitable by that same selection committee or whether it is correct to say that he only acts and hides behind that selection committee when it agrees with his own particular views or the views that he thinks will find the favour of his Party? I have heard it stated by the Minister, in answer to questions in connection with the appointment of auxiliary postmen, that that was the nomination of the selection committee. On other occasions I noticed that there was no mention of the selection committee but that such and such a man was appointed because he had service with the F.C.A. or some other branch of the emergency services. On other occasions he was appointed because of health reasons. On still other times he was appointed without any reason at all being given. I am led to suspect that the selection committee serves only as a cover when the particular individual selected is the nominee ofthat selection committee. I would like to see all appointments made without political favour or flavour. The test should be made by an independent selection committee and the best man, in its opinion, appointed.
I have noticed during the past year or so, in a number of our towns, that the Post Office men have been engaged in laying underground telephone wires. The Minister's Department is to be congratulated on that because it will mean that people using the telephones will not have to suffer the inconvenience of interruptions, due to a break-down of the system during stormy weather. A further extension of that work should be undertaken. The capital outlay involved would be quickly recovered since the cost of maintenance would be likely to be a great deal less than where the overhead wires are in use.
I should also like to see a further extension of the hours for the telephone service in rural post offices. In the past, so far as our small towns and villages are concerned, the local post offices closed at an early hour. During the last year or so the closing hour was extended to 10 o'clock. Since then something exceptional has happened. Up to a year ago, when one could not make a telephone call at the post office in a rural town, one was able to do so at the local Garda barracks. The facilities there were always courteously afforded to callers especially in cases of urgency. Within the past year, however, the strength of many of these Garda stations has been reduced, and the barracks are closed at 7.30 in the evening. In order to meet that situation I think a further extension of the telephone service in rural post offices should be made to meet the requirements of the people. It would be greatly appreciated by them.
I would ask the Minister to take note of another point in connection with the telephone service in the rural areas, many of which are connected with the central exchange by a single line. If a private subscriber is using the line and another person in the post office requires to make a call, he has very often to wait for a considerable time. I think there is need for an improvementthere. We know, of course, that such an improvement is going to cost money, but I suggest that service should be the aim of the Post Office. One remedy would be a double line service to the central exchange.
A number of Deputies have referred to the telephone kiosks. I suggest that, in all fairness to the people who use them, the position should not be such that their private business can become public property within two minutes of their leaving the kiosk. The fact that that happens is due to the faulty material used in the construction of those kiosks. There is one on a public square in a central position in the town in which I live. The person using it can be heard speaking by people two or three yards away from the box. That is something which the Department cannot be proud of. The number of kiosks should be increased in all our towns, so that all our citizens will have telephone facilities available to them without being obliged to make their calls either at a Garda station or at the house of a private subscriber. The Department in providing such facilities should not set as its standard what the cash reward will be.
I have from time to time addressed questions to the Minister with regard to the provision of more kiosks in working-class built-up areas in Waterford City, and in places like Tramore, and other towns and villages in my constituency. The Minister's reply has been that a check has been made by his Department which indicates that the number of people likely to avail of the service would not be sufficient to justify the cost involved. It should be the responsibility of a State Department to provide the service apart altogether from the monetary reward likely to be achieved.
