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departmental advisor !—we are the first to admit that our Public Service has not in fact been ruined by the new dispensation. The tradition of responsible public servants' political impartiality and reserve in controversial issues in politics is a well-established one; the unlimited licence to act otherwise has not been availed of. Yet we think the* danger is there and that in due time, in fairness both to the Public Service and to the community, the subject should be reconsidered. None of us would wish to lessen the rights or duties of a public servant as a citizen ; but we think that, consistent with these, it may well be made clear in the law as it is in practice that active participation in party political controversy does not rightly fall to career public servants, obliged as they are impartially to serve successive Governments in a democracy. We quote in this connection the words of the then Leader of the Opposition (now Prime Minister) in the Australian Commonwealth Parliament (June, 1949) : Suppose at the forthcoming election the present Opposition parties succeed and are called upon to form a Government. Suppose that, in such a Government, I find myself Minister for External Affairs; I shall be met, on my first morning, by the permanent head of the Department of External Affairs, who has pledged himself publicly to defeat me and who, but for the accident of his non-selection, would have been a candidate against a member of my party at the elections. Am I supposed to give him my confidence ? Am I supposed to say to him, "Of course, I understand that your dearest wish was to defeat me, but I can accept everything that you tell me because I know that whatever you tell me will be calculated to make my administration of this Department successful ? " We are not living in a world of archangels. We are living in a world of human beings, so let us talk sense about this matter. I could not have any confidence in the advice of the head of a Department in those circumstances, and I would not tolerate him as a head of a department. The result of that—and I urge all honourable members to consider this—is that, should this practice be accepted as general, instead of being only a stark, staring exception as it is now, we should find the heads of Departments changing with every change of Government. I cannot imagine anything more deplorable . . . The moment a Government says that the kind of thing under discussion is permissible that Government makes an attack on the Public Service and turns it from being highly respected, objective, and independent into something that is the mere servant of the political mood of the moment and in which the top ranks must be changed with every change of party administration. The Holmes Case ; Probation Over a long period, indeed ever since the Public Service Act was passed in 1912, it has been assumed that public servants should serve in the first instance on probation ; that their work and conduct then should determine whether they are fitted for a Public Service career ; that while on probation their employment may be summarily ended ; and that, recognizing the important distinction between the provisional status of the probationer and the full status of the established public servant, nothing short of explicit written confirmation, made after necessary reports have been considered, should serve to give a person the status of a permanent officer. These assumptions have been brought into question by judicial decisions during the past year. The case involving them raised issues important enough, and has certainly been the subject of misunderstanding and misrepresentation enough, to justify a short recital of the essential facts; It had been reported in the press that a large meeting of public servants in Wellington had threatened to hold a stop-work meeting in office hours if one of the Public Service Association's demands (for setting up a salaries tribunal) was not agreed to. The Commission issued a warning that any one so ceasing duty would be liable to dismissal in accordance with the Public Service Act. Generally the effect of the warning was salutary. No stop-work meeting was held without authority (under exceptional circumstances, as where shift-workers are involved, the Commission has elsewhere agreed to stop-work meetings). Presently, however, the Commission was informed that a stop-work meeting had been called at the National Film Studios in Wellington ; and, later, documents were put before it showing that Mr. C. Holmes, recorded as a probationary employee there, had been responsible. His appointment was annulled. The action taken was not because of the employee's membership of the Communist party, nor related to his political views. This was made clear to him in the course of

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