POLICE COMMISSION.

Waikato Argus, Volume IV, Issue 290, 19 May 1898, Page 2

POLICE COMMISSION.

REFORMS ADVOCATED BY COMMISSIONER TUNBRIDGE. (BY TELEGRAPH—PRESS ASSOCIATION). Wellington*, Last Night. The Police Commission was occupied all the morning hearing Commissioner Tunbridge detail the alterations and reforms he considered necessary. All classes should be abolished, and recruits taken fiom all classes of the community, and they should undergo a physical and mental examination. The Government should provide uniforms. The appointments of constables and sergeants should be left in the hands of the Commissioner. The men should begin at 6s and rise to 9s per day, according to their years in the service. Sergeants should receive from 9s 6d to 10s 6d ; and Inspectors from £3OO to £4OO per year. Detectives should be paid at the same rate as sergeants. A lodging allowance of Is per day should be granted to men without quarters after three years' service. It was impossible to get an efficient force without pensions, the maximum of which should be threefifths of the salary received. He would deduct 4 per cent, from salaries, and all fines under the Licensing, Gaming, and Police Offences Act should be paid into the pension fund. Government Departments receiving gratuitous services from the police should pay an annual grant to the fund. He did not consider the colony should be called on to pay much more than was now paid as retiring allowances. Police surgeons should be appointed in every important centre, and at least the force, which was now undermanned, required 50 more men. New ranks of sub-inspector should be created to enable inspectors to devote more time to thoroughly inspecting stations, which ought be done at least once every quarter. Sergt. - Majors should be abolished. Leave should be allowed to accumulate to 5S days, or if a man desired to go outside of the colony to six weeks. The licensing laws should be amended to make persons found on premises during prohibited hours punishable. He believed this would enable the police to check illegal trading, and do away with a good deal of the present outcry. He also advocated that any persons frequenting any place for the purpose of betting should be liable to punishment. Commissioner Tunbridge urged the compulsory retirement of constables and sergeants at the age of 60. He would recommend a system of pensions and gratuities, and constables should receive a pension, to provide for which a reduction be made from their pay at the rate of 4 per cent. If a countable died the deductions from his pay should be paid to his next of kin, and, if from accident while in the service, if a married man, the widow should receive a pension while she remained a widow. Men who resigned voluntarily, or were dismissed, should not receive back their contributions to the pension fund. Inspector Tunbridge said relative to the cost of police protection it was New Zealand, 2s 9d ; Victoria, 4s 2£d ; New South Wales, 5s 43 3d; Queensland. 6s 9d ; Western Australia, lis 3d. The strength of the force in New Zealand was 1 to 1461 ; South Australia, 1 to 1041 ; Victoria, 1 to 832; New South Wales, 1 to 692; Queensland, 1 to 579 ; West Australia, Ito 319. He declared that the extra 50 men required to bring the New Zealand force up to a state of efficiency would leave New Zealand at I in 1400 and the cost at 3s Bd. The Commission meets again in the morning.