Formula Sought For Fixing State Service Pay Scales

Press, Volume C, Issue 29657, 30 October 1961, Page 9

Formula Sought For Fixing State Service Pay Scales

(From Ow Own Reporter)

WELLINGTON. October 29. State employee organisations are expected to meet the Government this week to decide on a formula for presentation to the Government Services Tribunal, the statutory body for fixing the pay of public servants. The combined State service organisations earlier this year asked the Government to conduct a ruling rates survey and apply the results to State service pay. That survey has been completed and the results analysed. Margins between outside employment and Public Service scales have been assessed, the next, and forthcoming. step is negotiations between the State services coordinating committee, representing the Public Service Commission, the Poet Office and the Railways Department, and the employee organisations. If it is found that outside ruling rates have substantially increased, and they have tn a number of occupations, the Government will be in a difficult position, having regard to the economic situation. It is trying to restrain and reduce inflation, and at the same time will be faced with a situation where a great deal more money would be put into circulation in the form of pay increases. Limitations It has been part of the Public Service case that rises applied as a result of a ruling rates survey are made effective long after they have been enjoyed by other sections Public Service rates have long been a difficult problem. When award rates were generally paid in industry, there was an obvious basis of comparison and Public Service rates were related to award rates. After the relaxation of the Stabilisation Regulations in 1950, rates in industry rose substantially, and a special addition had to be made to award rates to fix Public Service rates which, being related to award rates, had slipped badly behind. In 1951 the National Government adopted the ruling rates survey procedure, which is applied in most other parts of the Commonwealth. It has been generally held to be fair and acceptable, subject to the reservation that rises in outside employment take a while to reach State employees. Time of Survey The method adopted was for the Labour Department to conduct a survey during a specified week and calculate the average rates paid to workers in specific trades. It is necessary to select a time when industrial employment is reasonably stable and surveys are customarily taken about October or March.

The results are then compared with current rates for tradesmen within the Government services, and after negotiations between toe employer and employee organisations, the Government Services Tribunal makes appropriate increases in the tradesmen’s scales. These increases are then passed on 1 by some agreed formula into other occupations in the Pubi lie Service. Since the first survey, surveys have been taken in 1952, 1954, 1956, 1958 and 1960. In 1957 the employee organisations requested that a survey be taken in October. Because an election was pending, the combined service organisations accepted the alternative that the survey be postponed till March, but any increases be backdated to January 1, half-way between toe date requested and that agreed upon. At the time it was felt there might be further increases in pay rates between November and March, such as commonly occur over the summer holiday, and this compromise was felt by both parties to be fair. When making the announcement, the present deputy Prime Minister (Mr Marshall) said: ‘“Hie Government has always felt the wages of its servants should be at least equal to the average rates of pay received by wage and salary earners outside the State services.” The incoming Labour Gov- ' ernment conducted the sur-

very, but later decided that toe results would not be applied immediately. This caused serious ill-will between, the State services and the Government and while the argument went on, the country was faced with serious economic problems similar to those now existing. The results of the survey were finally implemented on October 1, 1958, nine months after the date proposed by the previous Government Margins for Skill

A survey was held in 1960 and the results were taken into account when the margins for skill increases were made in Public Service scales just before the 1961 General Election. Earlier this year the combined services organisations asked the Government to conduct another ruling rates survey and apply the results to Government services’ pay. Conditions between Gov-ernment-service employment and private employment are naot strictly comparable. Such things as superannuation for public servants and special payments by way of various bonuses paid in outside industry must be taken into account. These have generally been considered to balance out each other, though the State service organisations have been claiming more and more loudly that the increasing tendency in outside industry to pay bonuses exceeds the advantages which ' Government servants get