GENERAL POST OFFICE

Evening Post, Volume CXXI, Issue 20, 24 January 1936, Page 8

GENERAL POST OFFICE

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —May 1 bring under the notice of the Postmaster-General the conditions under which the ninety employees are at present working in the long room situated immediately under the roof of the General Post Office, on which roof an additiflnal superstructure is being erected Since the work was begun these workers have had to eridure the horrible noises as if these were "driven into the top of their heads" caused by handling building materials, wrenching off various parts to make room for the constructjpn, etc. These noises being endured from morning till knocking-off time, are aggravated by the awful grinding caused by the putting up of the steel frame building for the Government Insurance, opposite the long room in question. Add to this the noises made by the members of this staff in manipu-. lating many typewriters, adding machines, bookkeeping machines, and various other mechanical devices, and one can judge the pandemonium under which mental work has to be carried out; the nerves of many of the staff are so frayed that from time to time some collapse and have to seek medical advice. As if, however, this were not enough, since the Christmas recess, the workers on the roof have caused, by boring holes, the plaster of the ceiling to come down in places, some on top of desks as well as between them, the dust covering their work and machines as well as themselves. And recently the dumping of girders on this roof caused bricks to come down; in one case there was a narrow escape.->-I am, etc..

COMMON SENSE.

[In reply' to the above the Deputy Director-General of the P. and T. Department stated that when two bits of plaster did fall down some ten days or a fortnight ago boring work was immediately stopped during the hours the room below would be occupied. There was no more noise than that inseparable from any building operations, but the addition to. the building was being made for the benefit of those workers on whose behalf the complaint is made. In- their new quarters when completed they would have much more space than they had now.]