CIVIL SERVICE SALARIES

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 643, 20 April 1929, Page 6

CIVIL SERVICE SALARIES

SIR JOSEPH ANSWERS PLEA PROMISE OF INVESTIGATION (From Our Resident Reporter) WELLINGTON, Friday. Believing that the country would soon be free to a very large extent from unemployment, Sir Joseph Ward hopes to be able to do something toward restoring the salary “cuts” in the Civil Service. In the meantime he is non-eommittaf. The question, he says, requires investigation. In replying: to the deputation which waited upon him, says the “Public Service Journal,” the Prime Minister said that before he became head of the Government the estimated cost of restoring the salary “cuts” had been unauthoritatively represented to him as .£2,000,000, but the figures had only been shown to him unofficially. If anything approaching that amount a year had to be paid it would stop the Government from doing anything, because they could not pay it. He could not ascertain definitely until the. end of the financial year what the liabilities were. The only safe course, from the Government’s point of view, was to appoint a committee of experienced officers to take the whole of the figures separately and let the Government find out where they were and what they could do. He had promised personally that he would investigate the matter and he wanted to see whether it could be done. He could not give an immediate answer to their representations; the matter could not be approached piecemeal. He did not see how he could meet the position in any way other than the way he had suggested—the setting up of a committee to consider all the representations. As soon as he was in a position to do so he would be glad to meet the association again and take them into his confidence. The Prime Minister said he agreed with all that had been said about the cost of living. There must be an adjustment of taxation in New Zealand. Some of the people were over-taxed and some were not taxed nearly enough. In making the necessary alterations there would be no giving away of revenue for the sake of popu- ■ larity. He was glad to be able to say he believed the country would be free to a very large extent from unemployment. The “Public Service Journal” states the report supplied to the association ended as above, but although they are not included therein, the final words of the Prime Minister were actually: “If the economic condition of the country continues as it is, I believe we can do something.”