asked the Minister of Labour whether he is aware that managers of branch employment exchanges are remunerated on a sliding scale varying with the number of unemployed persons on the register at their branches, and that the result is to diminish the remuneration of any branch manager in proportion to his success in obtaining work for applicants and reducing the number of unemployed; and whether he will so modify this system that branch managers shall not, by the prospect of diminished remuneration, be discouraged from endeavouring to reduce the number of applicants on the register at their branch exchanges?

The terms of remuneration of branch managers, which were revised last year, necessarily take account of substantial variations of the volume of work, but I do not think there is any foundation for the suggestion that the effect is to discourage branch managers from endeavouring to reduce the number of applicants on the register. On the contrary, in assessing the volume of work, account is taken of the manager's efforts to fill vacancies from his register.

Is it a fact that 25 hours are allocated for some of these exchanges when the work demands 80 or 90 hours a week, and are the wages at the sweated figure of £2 a week for some of the clerks?

That is another issue. This is the basic rate which was reviewed last year, and in certain circumstances there may be increases.