PUBLIC SERVICE SALARIES.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19786, 26 November 1929, Page 10

PUBLIC SERVICE SALARIES.

REPLY TO MR HOLLAND. MR COATES FAVOURS CERTAIN INCREASES. (PSESS ASSOCIATION TELESKAM.) WELLINGTON, November 25. The Leader of the Opposition, Mr Coates, in an interview, replied to the speech of Mr H. E. Holland, reported as having been delivered at Westport on Friday. '•The fact is,' 5 said Mr Coates, "that when the Beform Government reduced the salaries of the public servants (including members of Parliament) in 1922, the whole country was suffering from the effects of a very severe slump. The economic situation was almost critical, and the Government had appealed to the whole community to take in sail to enable it to weather the storm. So far as the public servants were concerned, the only alternatives were entered for all State employees to accept a percentage reduction, or else for Departments to make ends meet by discharging a. large number of employees. This was the situation in 1922, and the Government of the day was proud of the way in which the public servants had then faced the realities of the situation, and accepted the adjustment. "At the same time the Reform Government promised the public servants that their position would be reviewed at the earliest possible moment that the finances of the country permitted. Further, the salaries of nearly all public servants were afterwards increased as the result of reclassification. Having given an undertaking before the General Election that after the elections (at latest by April, 1929), the Government, when regarding and reclassification were under review, would consider the amount of the increase to be granted to public servants. j "I suggested in the House last session an immediate increase of £lO in maxima for men on £240, £265, and £295 limits. This was done before the half-yearly financial statement was presented, and when the United Government was still keeping the country in the dark about the financial position. At the same time Mr Holland and the Labour Party were engaged in a sham fight with their friends, the United Government. The Labour Party produced a motion recommending the Government to make an increase in public service salaries, but this motion was cunningly worded in such a way as to ensure that it could not be carried. It was suggested in the House that the wording of the motion might not have been the result of the unaided work of Labour members, or, if it were their own work, it was certainly designed to avoid embarrassing the Government by any risk of its going through. There was quite unnecessary and irrelevant reference to the original 'cut' as 'an unjust -levy.' This expression, in effect a vote of condemnation on the previous Government, cannot have been included for any other purpose than that of deterring Beform members from supporting it. If Mr Holland and the Labour Party were genuine in their desire to assist the public servants, and not actuated, as appearances suggest, solely by considerations of Party tactics, why could they not have confined their motion to the single essential of recommending an increase in salaries." Mr Coates said that he and the Reform members in the House had clearly and emphatically stated that they were in favour of such an increase had the matter been left at that. "Now that the half-yearly figures are available, and the revenue is found to be in a very healthy condition," said Mr Coates, "I wish to state with a full sense of responsibility, and with intimate knowledge both of the capacity of the Departments to pay, and also of the struggles of the lower paid public service officers, that I am prepared to increase by £ls per annum the maxima for men at £240, £265, and £295 limits. In saying this I know the feelings of my associates in Parliament."

MR COATES REFUSES HIS INCREASE. (PBESS ABBOCIATIOK TELEGRAM.) WELLINGTON, November 25. Another member of Parliament, the second, who does not intend to accept the additional £IOO members voted themselves in the dying hours of the session, is the Leader of the Opposition, Mr Coates. Mr Coates has instructed his bank at Dargaville to return the cheque to the Treasury, intimating that he will not take the money until the lowerpaid Civil Servants have received their promised increases.