NO TEA TIME

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 105, 28 January 1931, Page 10

NO TEA TIME

Commissioner’s Edict

PICNICS BANNED '

The tea adjournment enjoyed by public servants twice a day has been definitely abolished for men by an order of the Public Service Commissioner, and in future women employees are to be given the choice of partaking ’of either morning or afternoon tea. This order will do away with one of the most coveted privileges of the service. It was made with a view to cutting out waste time. In addition public service staff picnics are to be abolished. No official explanation of the reason for the abolition of both the tea-time adjournments and the annual picnics has been given, but it is understood to be part of the Government’s economy campaign. In the past, most Government offices have resounded to the clatter of tea cups at ten o’clock in the morning and at three.o’clock in the afternoon. Male employees will no longer be permitted either morning or afternoon tea, and women will have to do their day’s work with only one tea adjournment. The decision of the Public Service Commissioner follows similar action in Australia some months ago. It is unofficially estimated that the indirect saving through the enforcement of the order relating to the tea adjournments will run into thousands of pounds each year. There will be no direct monetary saving,' but it is estimated that the. time lost is enormous in the aggregate, nnd that the amount of work that will be done that would otherwise not be covered as a result of the time off taken for refreshment, will be far from insignificant. The Post and Telegraph Department had planned to hold its picnie on Anniversary Day, but it failed to receive permission for the outing. About 500 employees intended making the trip to a seaside resort, but the arrangements had ♦o be cancelled.