The Dominion WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1925. IN THE SERVICE OF THE STATE

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 228, 27 June 1928, Page 10

The Dominion WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 1925. IN THE SERVICE OF THE STATE

The Prime Minister paid a handsome compliment to the Civil Service when farewelling the retiring Under-Secretary of Internal Affairs (Mr. James Hislop) on Monday. “There are, he said, “men in the service of great calibre, who place their work above everything. They are the type who help in upholding the prestige of the Dominion.” It is the custom on valedictory occasions to say nice things about everybody. Those who know the Service for what it really is, a great administrative organisation, not as some people imagine, a vast hive of glorified clerks, will probably agree, however, that the Prime Minister’s compliment was something moie than mere lip service. . £ . . ,;n, The Civil Service is the public’s daily point of contact with government. There are some people in this country who rarely see a member of Parliament, much less a Cabinet Minister. To those people the public officials with whom they have dealings are to all fntents and purposes the Government itself. A Government occasionally suffers for the sins of the Service, per contra it sometimes happens that the public visits its ire upon the Service for a error of policy committed by a Government. lhe servants of the State should be efficient, and they should also be loyal, and it is to the credit of the New Zealand Service that there has been small cause for criticism qn these grounds. In British constitutional practice, Governments may come and go, but the Civil Service canies on, a continuing responsibility. In the United States a pollfa^ 1 dispensation brings a new administration with it Thiscons tn tional device may command a certain degree of loyalty to the political party in power for the time being, but it does not necessarily connote loyalty to the State. Under these conditions, it is impossible to build up any tradition of service such as that which, is so distinctive a feature of the British and Indian Civil Departments and the Colonial Office services in the Imperial colonies and protectorates. Generally speaking, it may be said that the Civil Service makes its own professional reputation and status. Its official juxtapositioi to the political machinery of government renders it highly necessary that its professional attitude should be strictly non-pohtical. One of the best things accomplished by the Reform Party, when it assumed the reins of government, was to place the Service entirely outside the field of political patronage. Under the previous system, so tenaciously gripped by the Liberal regime, the Service was encumbered, and its efficiency seriously prejudiced, by the addition of individual odds and ends for whom jobs had to be found in accordance with promises made by political patrons. Freed from this entirely vicious system, the Service has been in a position to set about building up a sound professional tradition. Its status, however, could be still further raised and protected. Views so admirably expressed by His Excellency the Governor-General on a recent occasion bear on this point. His Excellency .was discussing what seemed to him to be a serious gap in our education system in its apparent neglect to. provide “specialised training for Civil Service and political and administrative education for young people.” “One result of this gap in our educational system,” he said, “is that our public services must eventually suffer, and, more than that, our men will not be trained for wider positions in the service of the Empire. Our Civil Service in New Zealand at present is not built up as it is at Home from the pick of the University—men selected by means of a stiff competitive examination from those who have trained themselves specially for the service of the State. It cannot, indeed, be so built up until the necessity of such training for State servants is recognised, and facilities for such training are made available.”

To achieve what His Excellency suggests would involve a reorientation of the public’s ideas of the Civil Service, and new machinery for tlie preparation and admission of candidates. At present admission to the Service is governed to a large extent by examinations, but these constitute a general educational test. For the technical branches more specialised training and qualifications are desirable. But it is evident that the Governor-General was thinking of some means whereby public service in itself could be made a recognised profession, demanding special preparation and a trained point of view. It is a suggestion which invites attention and consideration in the interests both of the Service itself and of the community which it serves.'