AN EX-CIVIL SERVANT'S GRIEVANCE.

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 758, 5 March 1910, Page 4

AN EX-CIVIL SERVANT'S GRIEVANCE.

* The lengthy communication from Mb. Gilruth which we ' print in another column to-day will, we are sure, be read with interest and sympathy by all unbiased people. His letter traverses the debate which took place in the House on December 21 last on a motion by Me. Heedman to refer back to the Stock Committee, which reported that it had no recommendation to make, a petition by Mb. Gilrtjth for compensation for loss sustained by his unfair treatment by the Government. The kernel of Mr. Gilruth's complaint is the fact that in 1904 the Secretary of State for the Colonies cabled to the Government requesting that the Government Bhould transmit to Mr. Gilruth, who was then drawing £600 a year, the offer of the post of chief veterinarian for tho Transvaal. at a salary of £1000, rising to £1200. The Government refused to transmit the offer, and Mr. Gilruth lost the position, and was also defrauded of even the honour of having been askod to take it. These are indisputable facts: they have not received any real denial. Tho Hon. T. Mackenzie, in a speech that did him small credit, actually conveyed the impression that Mr. Gilruth was drawing on his imagination respecting this offer. He cast doubt at the same time upon his own bona fides, however, by insisting that tho Government could not be expected to allow its good officcrs_ to take more highly salaried positions elsewhere. He suggested alao—thus completing tho prooi that

he was hard pressed for excuses for an inexcusable attitude—that the Government had really spent a great deal of money on improving Mr. Gilruth's scientific knowledge. How unwarrantable this suggestion really is Mr. Gilruth makes very clear in his out-spoken letter. The attitude of the Government and the speeches of certainly justify Mr. Gilruth's assertion that "the Government considers itself justified in taking any steps within its power to block their chances of securing a better position in the only employ that the vast majority are fitted for by training, viz., that of another Government."