CO129-495 - Governor Sir Clementi - 1926 [11-12] — Page 286

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(36). In England the British Post Office have since 1912 installed a number of different types of Automatic exchanges, including several of "Strowger", and two of "Rotary" types in order to test them under practical service conditions and with a view to obtaining experience to guide them in decid upon a standard type of system for London and for the country as a whole. A decision in favour of the "Stronger" system was come to about eighteen months ago and at the present time large exchanges of this type for London and

also for several large cities such as Sheffield and 277

Edinburgh are in process of manufacture.

(37). A technical paper en titled "The Post Office and Automatic Telephones" was read by Col. Purves, the Engineer-in

-Chief of the Post Office on the 5th March last, and from

this paper it is gathered that the authorities in deciding

upon the adoption of the "Strowger" were influenced by two

(among other) important reasons, firstly:-because it was

necessary on view of the magnitude of the Automatic develop-

ment to decide on a particular system so as to bring about

a standardisation of circuits and mechanisms and also to

facilitate the training of the technical staff on the

technicalities on the one system, and secondly:- because the

"Strowger" apparatus is made by several firms in England and

it is the policy of the Department to purchase its supplies

as far as ever possible in the Country.

(38).

While the Antwerp "Rotary" system has not made much

headway in England (it is in use on the Municipally owned

system at Hull as well as at the two Post Office Exchanges

above referred to) it is in operation in a large number of

cities on the continent of Europe, and in other countries.

I myself have seen large exchanges on this system at the

Hague, Brussels, and Antwerp and all are working with com- plete satisfaction to the Administratione. It has been

adopted for use in the principal cities of Spain and just

before I left England I was informed that it was likele te