POSTAL DISMISSALS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 220, 17 September 1930, Page 8

POSTAL DISMISSALS.

REINSTATEMENT OPPOSED. WELLINGTON BUSINESS MEN PASS RESOLUTION. OATH OF SECRECY. (By Telegraph.—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, Tuesday.

Maintaining that it. was absolutely essential that secrecy should be observed in the. Post Office, the chairman of the Wellington Chamber of Commerce, Mr. D. J. McGowan, to-night expressed the opinion that the action of the Department in dismissing six officers of the Auckland Telegraph Office for divulging information in regard to telegrams deserved the commendation of the business community. A . resolution was passed protesting , against the reinstatement .of any officer who had been .found guilty of such offence. ' : Mr. McGowan said that since the last meeting of the council, of the chamber he had read"in the newspapers that the Parliamentary Committee had recommended that the men be taken on again for the reason that the' punishment of dismissal was too harsh. Aβ the matter of divulging , information in: the Post Office was. a most serious one, he had made it ■ his business to , ascertain :the facte. men concerned were suspected of divulging information in regard to racing telegrams. They were tried before a magistrate in Auckland and found guilty. They were then dismissed from the service. They were heard before an appeal board, consisting of. the magistrate, Mr. E. C. Cutten, as chairman, and two Departmental officers, one appointed by the Department and one member elected by the votes of those employed in the Department. The appeal wae dismissed, the speaker said, three members of the appeal board', including the in en's representative, concurring, in the decision. The men then petitioned Parliament, and he understood that the same evidence was given before the Parliamentary Committee. . Mr. McGowan said he had looked up the statutes on the question and found that in the Poet and Telegraph Act, it was provided that officers who divulged information in regard to telegrams were liable to a fine not exceeding £100, or to imprisonment for a period exceeding six months. In view of that it could not be said that the punishment was harsh. Postal, officers, he understood, took an oath ot secrecy Avhen they were employed and it was absolutely essential that this oath should be kept inviolate. "This," concluded Mr. MeGowan, "is essentially a, matter for the business men to consider." They should, he added, by every .means in their power support the Department in its endeavour to uphold the fine traditions that had existed in the Post Office. The fact that the telegrams were racing telegrams had no bearing on the question. They might as well have been business telegrams.