Public Service Retrenchment.

Press, Volume LVII, Issue 17221, 11 August 1921, Page 6

Public Service Retrenchment.

The Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants, recognising the probability of a strong public demand being made, as soon as Parliament begins work, for retrenchment in the public service, and the further probability that the Government will move in the desired direction, has decided that before anything else is done in this' direction all public servants with over 40 years' service,'who are entitled to retire, should be called upon to do so. Practically the same view was taken by the local section;of the Public Service Association the other night, when the general secretary, amid applause, argued that the burden of retrenchment should fall on those best able to bear it—first, temporary officers, next the men of forty years' service, who were eligible to retire on pension, and, Uv.tly, women employees, "because they had least to " lose." We have no desire to criticise this arrangement of the order in which the heads of the victims of retrenchment should fall, except to point out that the retirement of the men eligible to so out of the service otf superannuation might not necessarily mean economy. The retiring man's place would hare to be filled—his retirement Would mean, in fact, that a number of his subordinates would move a Btep, a fresh man would presumably be brought in to fill one of the lower positions, and, in the end, perhaps at once, perhaps not for a year or two, that particular- section of the service would be costing aa much as it does now, plus the amount of the retired officer's superannuation, of -which partf is paid by the Government. The economy in this is not bo perceptible, as are the advantages accruing to those officers who advance a.step when the man at the top goeß out. However desirable ." retrenchment" on these lines may seem to the younger members of the Public Service Association, it may be worth their while to exercise a little foresight and ask themselves what the effect on the superannuation fund might be if it was suddenly called upon to pay out superannuation to a number of men ranging in age from 52 or 53 to 67, still hale and vigorous as thousands of men of that age are in New Zealand, and with an "expectation of life" of at least another twenty years. A public servant with 40 years' service may, as we have said, retire 06 superannuation, but he cannot be compelled to do so, and few 1 of them do bo, especially if they see prospects of further advancement. Compulsory retirement in most branches of. the service, if not in all, does not operate until a man has reached the age of 65, when perhaps he may have nearly 60 years' service to his credit. We are not unmindful of the fact that a number of the older men did not join the superannuation scheme when it was introduced, preferring to remain under the then existing pension scheme, for which the superannuation fund was substituted. But, nevertheless, there are probably a sufficient number of public servants of 40 years' service subscribing to its superannuation fund to make their retirement en masse strain the resources of the fund severely. As we have indicated, we can quite understand why the younger members of the service want the men with long records to be retired. They are, no doubt, quite honest in their belief that such a policy would make for greater efficiency, and they may have been able to persuade themselves that it would reduce expenditure. It is because it iB not bo evident to those outside the Association that this would be the result that we are not enthusiastic about the proposal. We have more faith in the suggestion made by Mr J. P. Martin in Wellington a day or two ago, that the Ministry should set up a Board of Management and instruct it to reduce the expenditure on the public service by 20 per cent, in 12 months; That would mean a saving, on last . year's rate of expenditure, of more

than three millions. It is going to be done at Home, and, to compare small things with great ones, we do not see why it should be impossible in New Zealand.