although the men of the same class get 2s. a
week increase in the maximum.

It is understood from a reliable source that the higher officials of
the Post Office admit that the women on the whole have been scurvily
treated, and it is confidently expected that the Postmaster General
will modify and improve some of the proposals when the final revision
of the Report is undertaken. Apart from the various class interests,
the only recommendation that can be regarded as in any way
satisfactory to women is the abolition of the grade of Assistant Women
Clerks as at present constituted. The only form in which the new grade
could be at all acceptable would be in substitution for the grades of
Girl Clerk and Women Sorter with a scale of salary comparable to the
Male Assistant Clerk, in accordance with the claim placed before the
Holt Commission and before the Royal Commission on the Civil Service.
The insertion of a new water-tight compartment such as the Department
proposed, between the Women Sorters and Women Clerks would be
dangerous to the interests, and detrimental to the expansion of
both, while the present restriction of women to rank and file work
continues. It would press the Sorters still further down in the scale
by depriving them of all opportunity of succeeding to clerical work,
as the recruitment of the Assistant Clerks from their ranks would
inevitably be very small; and it would also injure the prospects
of promotion of the Women Clerks by decreasing their numbers and by
depriving them of higher posts due to growth of work and increase of
staff. This latter result was clearly foreseen by the Department when
the scheme was first promulgated. Moreover, it would be a blow to the
general status of women in the Post Office by depreciating the value
of their work and lowering the standard of their employment. It is a
matter for congratulation, therefore, that the Select Committee have
advised the abolition of the new grade, and the Postmaster General,
having agreed in the House of Commons to refer the matter to the
arbitrament of the Parliamentary Committee, can hardly repudiate their
decision.

[Footnote 1: See the end of the article for the Report of the Holt
Committee.]

[Footnote 2: The women are pressing for identical examinations.
[EDITOR.]]

[Footnote 3: The Postmaster General has recently (December 1913),
conceded the point, and has promised that there shall be no increase
in the hours of duty in the Post