REPORT ON THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING DEPARTMENT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30TH JUNE, 1868.

Appendix to the Journals of the House of Representatives, 1868 Session I, D-11

D.—No. 11.

REPORT ON THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING DEPARTMENT FOR THE YEAR ENDED 30TH JUNE, 1868.

PRESENTED TO BOTH HOUSES OE THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY, BY COMMAND OP HIS EXCELLENCY. ■ '

WELLINGTON.

1868.

D.—No. 11

Government Printing Office, Sir,— Wellington, 26th September, 1868. In submitting the following Report on the working of the Department under my control, I desire to state that my object in doing so is to afford the fullest information as to the results of our labours for the past financial year, and to point out what I consider still wanting to render the establishment prepared for the rapidly increasing demands made upon it during each succeeding Session of the Assembly. Before doing so, however, I may be permitted, in this my first Report, to notice the origin of the Printing Department, and the extent to which it has increased since its first establishment. A Commission, appointed by the Government in 1862, in accordance with a resolution of the House of Representatives, to inquire into the advisability of establishing a printing office in connection with the Government, reported in favour of the proposal, and an order was sent to Mr. Morrison, in England, to purchase the necessary plant, which arrived in Auckland in June, 1864, when a small staff of eight men and two boys were engaged, and the printing of the Gazette, departmental forms, and some of the Parliamentary Papers, was undertaken. Tho cost of the original plant was £844. It was, however, found totally inadequate to meet the requirements of the Government, and was immediately supplemented by a small order from Sydney, while the printing press and type used by Mr. Gorst in printing tho Pihoihoi, at Te Awamutu, proved a small but very acceptable addition to the original plant. ■ . On tho removal of the Department to Wellington the work increased very rapidly, rendering necessary the erection of a wing to the present building ; a very considerable addition was at the same time made to the plant, while the acquisition of a printing machine, worked by steam power, contributed greatly towards placing tho establishment on a much more efficient footing than it had been hitherto ; but the resources of the Department, even with these additions, were insufficient to enable it to cope with the work that came pouring in. Further additions of considerable importance have been made to tho plant of late. By the timely arrival of the " Henry Adderley " from London last month, a large supply of new type was received, which has enabled the whole of the Bills brought before Parliament this Session to be printed at this office —an achievement which I have never before been able to accomplish—a portion of the work having, in previous Sessions, been performed at the private printing establishments in this City. The men and boys now permanently employed in the Department, exclusive of tho Printer, consist of thirty persons —namely, two Overseers, one Reader, twelve Compositors, three Pressmen, one Machinist, one Engineer, three Apprentices, and seven Boys. It is proposed to add two more Compositors to the permanent staff this year, the increase of work in the Office fully justifying the proposed addition. During the Session the services of an extra Reader are engaged for the Hansard, while the staff of extra Compositors varies according to the pressure of work —fifteen being the number at present employed. Next in importance to a sufficiency of type, is the necessity of providing proper Office accommodation. During the recess, the present building is found sufficiently large for the ordinary work of the Department; but when the Assembly is in Session, and the necessity arises for the employment of a large staff of extra hands, very great inconvenience is felt —an inconvenience which has materially increased since the Department undertook the work of printing the Parliamentary Debates. Should the work continue to increase in the same ratio as in the past two years, the demand for additional space will become an absolute necessity. Two printing machines—double-crown Belle Sauvage—are now in use in the Office, each capable of producing eleven hundred impressions per hour. In addition to these, there are also five handpresses, varying in size from crown to double-demy, which are capable of producing, collectively, about one thousand three hundred impressions per hour. It will thus be perceived that the machines and hand-presses combined are capable of producing three thousand five hundred impressions per hour if they were all in full work. One of the machines above referred to was procured from Melbourne about twelve months ago, and was purchased mainly with a view to facilitate the printing of the Acts for circulation after they had received the Royal Assent. Great complaints were made at the delay which usually took place in printing the Statutes—more especially when many of them had actually come into force. But this delay was quite unavoidable as far as tho Printing Department was concerned. When it is remembered that out of ninety-five Acts passed last Session, ninety-two of them only received the Royal Assent on the last day of the Session —the 10th of October —it will be perceived that the whole work of printing the Statutes could only commence at a period when it was highly necessary they should have been completed, and ready to be placed in the hands of the public. Had the Royal Assent been obtained to the Bills from time to time as they were passed through the Legislature, a considerable portion of the Statutes —more than one-half probably —might have been printed off and in the hands of the public before the termination of the Session. The very large number of these Acts which have to bo printed necessarily occupy a considerable time in machine work alone —especially when the Statute Book assumes the proportions of that of 1867. The Legislature, however, have endeavoured to remedy the evil this Session, by deciding that all Bills be laid before the Governor for the Royal Assent from time to time as they pass the House, with a view to enable the printing to be proceeded with during the Session.

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It is superfluous to give any description of the type used in the office, as the non-professional reader would learn nothing from an enumeration of the technical names by which they are distinguished. Some of tho founts of type are necessarily very large, especially that in which Bills are submitted to the Legislature. The necessity for having so much of the same kind of type will be apparent from the fact that at the present time I have about ninety-six Bills in type, some of which are of considerable length, and number in all close upon five hundred pages. It is generally necessary to keep tho "formes" of all the Bills standing during the entire Session of Parliament, while it is always necessary to keep them standing until finally disposed of by the Legislature. This has not been possible hitherto, owing to an insufficiency of type, and a great deal of loss and vexatious delay has been the consequence. The large addition lately received, however, will enable this to be done for the future. The necessity for keeping the Bills in type is caused by the numerous amendments, alterations, and corrections which are continually going on during the passage of Bills through their different stages ; and those changes have often to be made in the greatest haste, when the Houses are sitting, or in time for the sitting next day. If the pages are not in type, and in " chase " also, when those corrections are required to be made, the course of legislation on the measure would be impeded, as, in many cases, it would be impossible to " set up " a Bill and make tho necessary alterations within the time at which it must again be in tho hands of honorable members. Besides the necessity of having Bills always in type that tho alterations required may bo quickly effected, there is this further cogent reason, viz., the saving of expense. If a whole Bill had to be " set up " every time the measure was discussed in either branch of the Legislature, the expense of printing Bills during the Session would be somewhat startling. I have endeavoured to show, in the Return appended to this Report, the amount of work turned out of the establishment during the last twelve months. It will bo seen by that Return that the number of copies printed off during the year ended 30th June last, amounted to 4,264,325; the number of pages " set up " during the same period, to 15,520; and the value of the work performed, to £11,455 15s. lOd. With reference to the "number of copies printed," I deem it necessary to observe that while a single page is called one copy, a large Parliamentary Paper or Bill, of say thirty or forty pages, is also called one copy; so that the 4,264,325 copies include every distinct publication, from a single page up to the most voluminous Return presented to Parliament, and each is reckoned a unit in the column headed " Number of Copies Printed." It is also necessary to mention that tho column headed " Amount for Printing " does not show the actual cost of the work performed. The amount placed opposite each Department as the charge for the printing of that particular Department during the year, shows the approximate cost only, and it is arrived at in this way:—For such works as Gazettes, Journals, Appendices, Statutes, and Statistics, a uniform charge is made, whether the page be intricate tabular work or a heavy small-typo page of solid matter. A. similar rule is applied in charging for all departmental forms, according to size, without regard to the type in which they may be set, or the amount of work they may contain. The uniform price has been so arranged that, taking the whole of the work performed, it is always below the actual cost. This system of charging for the work is adopted in both the Government Printing Offices of Victoria and New South Wales, and has been adopted by me for these reasons :— First, that if exact charges had been made, it would have occupied much more time than I have at command to have " cast up " the work and kept the books for the purpose of showing all the minute calculations necessary to arrive at those correct charges ; and, secondly, because I consider a uniform charge for the several classes of work sufficient to show the relative cost incurred for printing by the several Departments, if it were at any time deemed necessary to institute a comparison. When required, however, the exact cost of any particular printing could be furnished; and, as correct files are kept of all the work done, the exact amount that would have been paid for any particular work included in the Return could easily be shown. It may readily bo supposed that if the exact value of the work done had been stated, the whole amount would have been much larger than it is. The amounts for printing, as stated in the Return, do not include any charge made for corrections and alterations, except in the case of Hansard, on which work, as a rule, the amount of time absorbed in making members' corrections is fully equal to the cost of setting up the copy afresh. Of the printing performed in the Department, a very large proportion consists of intricate tabular forms. As examples of this description of work, I may refer to those printed by the Registrar-General's Department, which includes the Census forms and the various Statistics of the Colony. The latter have been printed in this Department for the first time during the past year, the removal of the Registrar-General's Department to Wellington rendering it no longer necessary to have the work performed at private offices. The Treasury also supplies a considerable amount of heavy table work, and all tho Departments have occasionally work of that description to be performed; so that, on the whole, it may safely be affirmed that considerably more than one-third of the printing is tabular work. It is well-known, even to non-professional men, that this description of printing is charged considerably higher than the ordinary kind of plain book-work; in some cases the charge is double, in others one-half extra, and in every instance more than ordinary matter. This extra charge is made on account of tho variety of materials required in tables, and the additional time necessary to " set up " a table page as compared with a plain page. For the purpose of indicating the class of work issued from this Department, I annex a list of tho more important publications which have been printed during the past financial year. There are, in addition, a number of smaller pamphlets, &c, which I have deemed it unnecessary to enumerate ; the following list, however, will be found to comprise all of any importance:—

Appendix A.

REPORT ON THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING OEEIOE.

B.—No. 11.

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LIST of WORKS published at the GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE.

The whole of the departmental forms used throughout the Colony are now printed at this Office. The rapid growth of several of the Departments —of which the Telegraph and Judicial Departments may be specially instanced —creates a steadily increasing demand for forms. The number printed for the use of the various stations of the Telegraph Department during the past year was 965,842 ; while those for Judicial Departments reached the number of 1,138,008. The results of recent legislation necessitated the reprinting of all the forms under the " Justices of the Peaco Act " and the " Resident Magistrates Act;" very large numbers of these had therefore to be supplied in order to stock the various Courts previous to those Acts coming into operation. The Census, also, caused a considerable amount of printing, such as the household schedules and enumerators' forms, which were all printed at this Office. The Return appended to this Report shows a total of 219,980 copies printed during the year for the Registrar-General, the greater part of which consists of Census forms. The number of forms now in use throughout the Colony is very considerable. The following list will show, as correctly as I am able, those now used in the several Departments specified, and which, it should be remembered, are constantly being augmented by the new laws yearly added to the Statute Book. The total number is six hundred and twenty-three, which are thus distributed among the Departments: — Law and Justice : —■ Resident Magistrates' forms (English) ... ... ... 41 (Maori) ... ... ... 8 Justice of the Peace forms ... ... ... ... 61 District Court forms ... ... ... ... 98 Supreme Court forms ... ... ... ... ... 35 Curators and Bankruptcy ... ... ... ... 15 Coroners' forms ... ... ... ... ... 16 Postal: —■ General forms ... ... ... ... ... 97 Quarterly forms .. ... ... ... ... 13 Annual forms ... ... ... ... ... 6 Savings Bank forms ... ... ... ... ... 17 Customs ... ... ... ... ... ... 24 Registrar-General's forms ... ... ... ... ... 23 Stamp Office... ... ... ... ... ... 21 Treasury ... ... ... ... ... ... 12 Telegraph ... ... ... ... ... ... 24 Defence ... ... ... ... ... ... 26 Printing ... ... ... ... ... ... 6 Miscellaneous ... ... ... ... ... ... 80 623

The next matter to which I desire to refer, is the Statement of the Receipts of the Department, which will be found appended to this Report. It will be seen that the total receipts by the Government Printer last year amounted to £491 Is. 2d.; of this amount, £133 ss. 9d. was realized upon advertisements and subscriptions to the Gazette, and a further sum of about £20 may be added as the proceeds of sale of loose copies. The Gazette may therefore be considered almost self-supporting. The sale of the Parliamentary Debates has not been as great as was anticipated, the receipts from this scource amounting only to £81 18s. lid. It is expected that a larger number will be sold during tho present year; but the very extensive and liberal free issue of the Debates interferes in some degree with their sale. The sale of Parliamentary Papers has hitherto been almost nil. The practice of binding up all the loose copies remaining after they have been distributed to both Houses—usually about 750 copies are bound in this way —prevents persons wishing to purchase any particular paper from doing so, as it is

Appendix B,

(a) The actual number of pages contained in the volume is 718, of which 124 pages were printed at private offices. (b) Actual number of pages in volume, 1,316 ; C 6 pages printed at private offices. 2

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REPORT ON THE GOVERNMENT PRINTING OEEICE.

necessary to buy the whole volume in order to get what is wanted. A change in this system, however, is contemplated this year, a small number only being bound up in volumes, while the remainder will be stitched up in separate papers, according to subjects, which will afford greater facilities for their sale than hitherto. Before concluding, I may be permitted to observe that the important and responsible duty of printing the Duties Stamps was entrusted to the department of the Government Printer in December, 1866. The commencement of the work was attended with a great many difficulties, mainly owing to the want of suitable inks and paper, which could only be procured from England ; but these difficulties have now been surmounted; a plentiful supply of the proper materials are to hand ; and the work of printing the stamps is performed at a very trifling cost to the Government. They are now printed on paper chemically prepared, and watermarked, and by the use of " fugitive" inks the stamps cannot by any possibility be tampered with. They are printed from electrotype dies, in the same manner as impressions are taken from type, while the various denominations are impressed by ordinary printing type on the face of the stamps in a different colored ink ; thus the same dies answer for all the denominations required, from one penny up to ten pounds. The great variety in the value of the stamps —originally about sixty in number —caused a deal of work in adjusting the type and figures so many different times. The number of denominations has been very considerably reduced of late —many of those printed never having been used. The Postage Stamp Printer, who was until June, 1867, connected with the Department of the Postmaster-General, has been transferred to the Printing Department, by which arrangement the work of gumming, drying, and perforating both the duty and postage stamps is now performed with the addition to the original staff of one youth only, at a salary of £42 per annum. Apartments have been provided for the various operations required in the rear of the Printing Office, which, while affording ample accommodation, secure at the same time the privacy which work of such a responsible character demands. I cannot conclude this Report without noticing the Workmen employed in the Department, and testifying my appreciation of the steadiness, diligence, and aptness displayed by them in the performance of their work. The excellence exhibited in the work issued from the office is in no small degree owing to their skill and efficiency. I desire also to bear testimony to the zeal and ability manifested by the Overseers in the performance of their onerous and responsible duties ; and likewise to the Readers, upon the proper performance of whose duties the character of the work so much depends. I have, &c, George Didsburt, The Hon. the Colonial Secretary. Government Printer.

Appendix A. RETURN showing the AMOUNT of WORK performed for the several DEPARTMENTS during the Twelve Months ended 30th June, 1868.

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Appendix B. STATEMENT of RECEIPTS by GOVERNMENT PRINTER for the Twelve Months ended 30th JUNE, 1868.

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