In the House of Commons on Monday Mr. Hanbury un-
folded the Government's proposals in regard to the telephones. The Post Office intend in the future to exercise their un- doubted and absolute right to set up telephone exchanges and to compete with the National Telephone Company on its own ground. The Post Office will be allowed 22,000,000 for capital expenditure, and it will begin work at once in London. It will also grant the greater municipalities- i.e., those of over fifty thousand inhabitants—the right to set up local exchanges. In London an attempt will be made to tap a class which does not now avail itself of the telephone. This will be done, as in Switzerland, by putting the subscrip- tion at a low figure, £3, but charging a small fee for each message. Sir James Fergusson, who spoke as a director of the National Telephone Company, defended its actions, and declared that it was being treated as a criminal, when in reality it had done nothing to deserve punishment. That, however, is not a fair way of stating the matter. The Government, by adopting the present scheme, is only doing what it has a perfect right to do, and what, indeed, it ought to do in the public interest seeing that the National Telephone Company has created a virtual monopoly. The scheme was not only very well received by the House, but has been welcomed by the Press with enthusiasm.
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