The existence of this double standard of payment for the same kind of work is not only an injustice to the women concerned, but is a standing menace to the men, who rightly consider that the presence of women as a blackleg class keeps down their wages and reduces their prospect of promotion. A sense of irritation and dissatisfaction is thus engendered between the two sexes. The maintenance of separate staffs of similar status but with different rates of remuneration, enables the department to play off one against the other, for the existence of a lower paid class makes it increasingly difficult for the Men Clerks to substantiate a claim for better pay themselves. The standard of their work is raised by the "moving-down" or "degrading" of duties, without any improvement in pay such as they would probably be able to obtain if women were not involuntarily undercutting them. Women fully sympathise with their male colleagues, whose prospects are injured in this way, but they insist that the only solution of the difficulty is equal treatment and fair and open competition. The Association of Clerks of the Second Division supported the Women Clerks' claim for equal pay for equal work in their evidence before the Royal Commission on the Civil Service, and it is gratifying that, in spite of the determined policy of the department to adhere as far as possible to the absurd segregation of the sexes, the two organised bodies of Men and Women Clerks are on excellent terms. In 1883 the class of Women Sorters was instituted, its original scale of pay ranging from 12s. per week, increasing by annual increments of 1s. to 20s. per week. In 1885 a first class was created with a maximum of 30s. per week. The Tweedmouth Committee of 1897 abolished the classification, and substituted therefor an efficiency bar at 21s., so that, unless incompetent, all the Women Sorters have a right to proceed to the maximum of 30s. Since the salary was fixed at that figure, the work of the Sorters has greatly improved in character. Originally introduced for the purpose of sorting, arranging, and filing the multitudinous kinds of official documents and papers, they have by degrees taken over more and more of the simpler duties formerly performed by the Women Clerks, until, at the present day, it is no exaggeration to say that nearly one-half of their duties consists of elementary clerical work. The Women Sorters are recruited from an examination of the same standard as that hitherto applied to Telegraphists, and the Women Sorters' Association claims that the principle of equality between Sorters and Telegraphists, which was recommended to the department by the Tweedmouth Committee in 1897, should be applied to the Women Sorters. Prior to 1900, vacancies occurring in the female staff at the Returned Letter Office were filled by transferred Women Telegraphists, but since that date, vacancies have been filled by successful candidates at the Women