RESENTMENT STILL

Waikato Times, Volume 125, Issue 20906, 11 September 1939, Page 12

RESENTMENT STILL

PUBLIC SERVICE TESTS LEGAL ADVIGE TO ASSOCIATION “There is no abatement of the indignation and resentment that has swept throughout the public service as the result of the imposition of the Pubic Service Commissioner’s precious efficiency tests,” says the Public Service Journal.” ‘‘They have resulted in a burning resentment being created in the minds of that section of the public service—over ‘-*OO0 —which has already passed through the full period of study, and emerged with university degrees, accountancy and law examination and other credentials, which the controllers of the public service have up to the present encouraged. These credentials were to equip their holders with the ‘open sesame* to the very highest positions in the public service—subject, of course, to relative efficiency—but today salary barriers have been ■provided over which they cannot leap unless they pass further service-exam-inations. It has happened in the past, and, under such conditions as the Commissioner has created, it must not happen in the future, that some public servants will be entrusted with duties that will justify the payment of a higher salary, but which won’t now be provided unless they have passed certain efficiency tests. What a travesty I” No Withdrawal The “Journal” states that the executive officers of the association Interviewed the Public Service Commissioner to protest against the imposition of the efficiency tests and to ask for their complete withdrawal. The Commissioner had replied that he was not prepared to withdraw the tests, as published in the official circular, but that he was willing to discuss modifications. The executive officers raised the question of the legality of the Commissioner’s proposals and, after giving certain specific instances, asked that, in view of the sweeping nature of the changes and the serious effect on the service, the Commissioner agree to submit the whole question to the Solicitor-General for his opinion. ‘Again the Commissioner declined to lake Ihis very reasonable course,” says the “Journal.” The acting-Prime Minister, the Hon. P. Fraser, gave the executive officers an almost immediate interview. The association’s requests and arguments in support were placed before him, as well as full details of what was considered to he the unreasonable attitude of the Public Service Commissioner. ‘Mr Fraser's attitude was that he was not against efficiency tests but the question was: In what form? He asked that the association co-operate with the Commissioner in securing a satisfactory solution of that query. Legal Opinion Mr Fraser was told that the association’s view on the question of the Commissioner’s legal powers was supported by its solicitor’s opinion. On behalf of the Government, the Minister agreed to place the matter before tlie Solicitor-General. The opinion obtained from the association’s solicitor, Mr E. P. Hay, stated that he had come to the conclusion that in issuing the announcement the ■Commissioner had entirely misconceived his powers, and that so far at least as the proposed second, third and fourth efficiency tests were concerned, they were beyond the scope of the authorities conferred upon him by regulation 190, under which they purported to be established.