Evidence presented before: The Royal Commission appointed to inquire into the Civil Establishments, 1888; and the Tweedmouth Committee, 1897. Instances of intervention by Members of Parliament. Mr. Austen Chamberlain, Financial Secretary to the Treasury, in April, 1902, states that at a low estimate one-third of the time of the highest officials in the Post Office is occupied with petty questions of discipline and administrative detail, because of the intervention of Members of Parliament. He adds that it is "absolutely deplorable" that time and energy that should be given to the consideration of large questions must be given to matters that "in any private business would be dealt with by the officer on the spot." Sir John Eldon Gorst's testimony before the Committee on National Expenditure, 1902. [Sidenote: _M. P.'s and the Rank and File_] In 1888, Mr. Harvey, a Member of the Royal Commission appointed to inquire into the Civil Establishments, asked Sir S. A. Blackwood, Secretary to the Post Office since 1880: "Now I should like to ask you ... whether you consider there is a distinct tendency among the clerical establishments [_i. e._, the clerks above the rank and file], especially the lower division clerks, to develop what for want of a better term I will call trades union spirit?" "Yes, I believe there is a good deal of evidence of that." "Have you, yourself, found it difficult to deal with that; is it a factor in your administration [of the Post Office]?" "Not with regard to the lower division clerks [above the rank and file]; it is with regard to the subordinate ranks of the service, the rank and file; amongst them there is a very strong tendency in that direction." "A growing tendency?" "It is certainly growing." "A growing tendency then we may say to introduce the coöperation of Members of Parliament to deal with individual grievances?" "A very strongly growing tendency." At this point Mr. Lawson interrupted: "Individual or class grievances?" "Class grievances, but there are a great many instances in which individual grievances are brought forward [by Members of Parliament]." "The point of the question was whether this spirit of trades unionism was evoked for the sake of bringing forward individual grievances, and you said yes; and then I asked whether it was class grievances or individual grievances?" "I mean class grievances, but it is made use of in respect of individual grievances." Mr. Harvey resumed: "And you think it is growing?" "I think it is strongly growing." "So we may say, to repeat the question I put just now, that it makes a factor in your administration of the Post Office, and you have always to be prepared to meet this growing tendency?" "It is continuously raising difficulties, and very serious ones."