On July 6, 1905, while the House of Commons was in Committee of Supply, and was considering the vote upon the Post Office, there was a long and instructive debate upon the Report of the Bradford Committee.[230] Lord Stanley, Postmaster General, opened the debate with a quotation from _The Post_,[231] the Post Office employees' organ. The statement quoted read: "Not only do we object to the composition of the [Bradford] Committee, but we take the strongest exception to its terms of reference. The inquiry as to whether our wages are adequate or otherwise becomes a farce if their adequacy is to be judged by the standard of wages of the open labor market. No such comparison would be reasonable or fair. There is no other employer who fixes his own prices or makes an annual profit of $20,000,000. There is no other class of work which can be compared to the Post Office work, neither any other employee who can be compared with the Post Office servants.... Surely Mr. Chamberlain does not think we should regard such an inquiry as final. If he does, the sooner his mind is disabused the better." Lord Stanley next discussed the manner in which the Bradford Committee had made recommendations which were based on no evidence whatever. For instance, in order to improve the chances of promotion, the Committee had recommended the creation of additional higher posts--"for which there was no work." In one Department of the Post Office that recommendation would mean the increase in the number of overseers from 250 to 900. Lord Stanley next made lengthy comparisons between the wages received by letter sorters and telegraphists on the one hand, and employees of equal intelligence and attainments in the service of private companies on the other hand. He showed that in London the maximum wage of the sorters and telegraphists was equal to the salary of the "non-college-trained certified teacher," and that in such provincial cities as Hull, Swansea and Exeter it was larger. "The only comparison which was not entirely upon his [the Postmaster General's] side was that with the clerks in the cable companies, who were paid more than the Post Office cable room operators. But the work of the cable companies' operators was more arduous, and there was liability to be sent abroad at any moment. But he had granted the Post Office cable room operators an increase of pay." He added that the ultimate aggregate cost of the increases in pay made since the publication of the Bradford Committee's Report would be $642,000 a year.[232] [Sidenote: _The Postmaster General applies the Terms "Blackmail" and "Blood-sucking"_]