The Press THURSDAY, JUNE 27, 1935. Teachers and Politics

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21510, 27 June 1935, Page 10

The Press THURSDAY, JUNE 27, 1935. Teachers and Politics

The action of the Seddon Memorial College Board in granting leave, after consultation with the Education Department, to one of its teachers to contest the Lytteiton by-elec-tion raises a question of very great interest to the community and to jpublic servants in particular. It is [laid down in the public service regulations, which apply, of course, only to those branches of the service under the control of the Commissioner, that public servants may take "no active part in politics" beyond recording their votes in elections; and the tendency has been, particularly in recent years, to interpret this part, of the regulations very strictly. It would appear from a recent case, for instance, that a public servant renders himself liable to disciplinary action merely by asking questions at a political meeting. There can be little doubt, therefore, that public servants have no right of Parliamentary candidature, a generalisation which applies to employees of the Railways and Post and Telegraph Departments as well as to public servants under the control of the Commissioner. It may reasonably be asked what grounds exist for treating teachers differently from other servants of the State. The view of the ActingDirector of Education is, apparently, that teachers are employed by local boards and not by the Education Department. Considering how persistently and successfully the Department has sought to whittle away the powers of local boards over teachers, this sudden modesty is a little surprising. And considering that, in ail important matters, teachers are under the control of the Department, it seems hardly possible to deny that the teaching service is a national service and that teachers are in fact employees of the Department. In any case, even if it were possible to uphold the Acting-Director's contention that teachers are the employees of local boards, it is difficult to see how a grant of permission to a teacher to contest a Parliamentary election can be reconciled with the notorious section 53 of the Finance Act, 1932. It is laid down in this section that any public servant or teacher renders himself liable to dismissal if it can be shown that "by public statements or by " statements intended for publica- " tion ... he has sought ■to bring " the Government of New Zealand "into disrepute." It seems, then, that unless Mr McCombs is prepared *to render himself liable to dismissal from the teaching service, he must in his election campaign refrain from any serious criticism of the actions or policy of the present Government. It is a thoroughly ridiculous situation and reveals the need for a much clearer definition of the political rights of employees of the State. Section 59 of the Finance Act, 1932, is perhaps unduly repressive and opens the way to serious abuses. On the other hand, the principle that public servants may not be candidates for Parliament is a sound one and is accepted in Great Britain, the United States, and most European countries.