Condition of Clerks Improved.
The Money Order Department being thus made self-supporting, I felt justified in recommending not only a considerable increase in the salaries of the probationary clerks, but also an addition to those of the lowest grade on the staff. I was also enabled to extend and regulate the leave of absence in the department. A few months afterwards, the Postmaster-General thus described the latter measure in the Upper House, reporting afterwards that the Lords were much struck with it:—
“The clerks in the Money Order Office were divided into classes, and twelve were counted in a class where it was calculated that eleven could do the work, so that by this means one might be always absent, and thus every clerk enjoy a month’s leave of absence in the year. Now that was not an unjust nor a severe arrangement, but much more just and impartial than the old system, by which one clerk might be away for a considerable time, and another could get no leave of absence at all. They were allowed to work for one another, and in case of illness, if the absentee was away more than a month, he might have his work done by paying for it. This had been agreed to by all the classes but two; and there was now in the Money Order Department of the Post Office a case of a gentleman who had been ill for eleven months during the last two years, and his colleagues worked for him without a penny of remuneration, knowing that he really was ill and unable to attend himself.”[88]
New Head of Department.
In the course of this period, on the sudden death of Mr. Barth, the President of the Money Order Office, the vacancy was filled, much to my satisfaction, by the appointment of Mr. Jackson, who had zealously seconded me in improving the department, and who, I am glad to say, retained his post many years, much to the advantage of the service and the benefit of the public.
A Paradox.
There remains to mention a ludicrous perplexity, showing how easy it is, amidst complicated changes, for even those who have best opportunity of judging, and are most interested in arriving at the truth, to fall into misconception. In the early part of 1850, when we confidently believed that correspondence of all kinds was, as usual, on the increase, we remarked, to our surprise, a falling-off in the number of letters passing through the Inland Office, and speculated much as to its cause. Mr. Bokenham attributed it to a decrease in Sunday letter-writing; but the mystery was at length explained by our simply calling to mind that the natural effect of a recent improvement in the Money Order Department was to relieve the Inland Office of about forty-six thousand packets per week, a number somewhat more than enough to account for the decrease.
GENERAL ECONOMIC MEASURES.
Clerks in Charge.
There was an abuse demanding correction, of which the following is a specimen. A clerk in the chief office, in receipt of about £82 per annum, was sent to act temporarily as clerk to one of the surveyors, and, for one cause or other, his exceptional employment was prolonged from two months to fourteen. Further, it happened that during two months of the fourteen he had charge of the Gloucester Post Office. By this lucky combination of circumstances, his emoluments for the time were at the annual rate of £452, or between five or six times his ordinary income. I took some steps with a view of putting things on a juster footing, but found the abuse too strongly sustained to allow me much hope of removing it until I should obtain more uncontested authority.