Police Policy On Second Jobs

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30499, 22 July 1964, Page 3

Police Policy On Second Jobs

(From Out Own Reporter) WELLINGTON, ’/ July 21.

No purge had been carried out anywhere to catch policemen taking secondary employment without permission, the Commissioner of Police (Mr C. L. Spencer) has told the chairman of the Constitutional Society in Christchurch (Mr L. A. Prouting).

Mr Spencer was replying to statements at last month’s meeting of the society when the prohibition on second

jobs for policemen was condemned. Today, Mr Spencer said permission had been given to policemen to undertake secondary employment when there could be no complaint from either other workers or workers’ unions. He also said the police salary scale and conditions compared very favourably with those in other employment He emphasised that there was no infringement by his department of any democratic rights of its members and that the police had to demand undivided loyalty. “After all, it is a disciplined service,” said Mr Spencer in a letter to the Constitutional Society, and secondary employment meant union membership which placed a policeman in an invidious position

when there was a union “squabble” with the employer. “The same position arises at a time of industrial strife.” Commenting on a statement by Mr E. L. May at the society’s meeting, Mr Spencer said the Police Department had no access to Inland Revenue Department files. Its knowledge of secondary employment came from complaints from civilian workers or union secretaries. The department did not pay penal rates, but an amount was incorporated in the salary scale to cover overtime, Mr Spencer told the society. A constable had to be on duty all the time, he said, “and it must ever be so if the public are to receive the service they pay for—hence the requirement prohibiting sec-

ondary employment without my written consent. “There are a few types of such employment from which there can be no repercussion and, in such cases, the required written permission is given.” Mr Spencer said no doubt the society could be a power for good, but not if it intended to operate as it has done in this case. "All the society has done in this case, by its publicity, is to create discomfort in the police,’’ and also represent him as the formidable head who would not allow the police to take secondary employment.

He was not opposing the society’s aims, but he was against harmful publicity without reasonable inquiry first, said Mr Spencer.