STATEMENT DENIED

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 181, 27 April 1940, Page 13

STATEMENT DENIED

Compilation Of National Register ATTITUDE OF CIVIL j SERVICE J t Statements published recently re- ] garding a proposal that members of the Public Service should be asked to i work overtime without pay on the compilation of a national register of ; manpower, are challenged by the secretary of the Public Service Asso- - elation, Mr. F. W. Miller. The report made to “The Dominion” that the proposal had been killed owing to the unfavourable attitude of the younger men of tlie service is flatly contradicted by Mr. Miller. “Now that publicity has been given to what is a purely domestic matter of the association,” Mr. Miller states, “it is necessary to outline the exact posi lion. Neither the Government, through tlie Public Service Commissioner, nor the Public Service Association has made any proposal that the work of compiling the manpower register should be carried out by public servants working overtime without pay, therefore no question of rejection or ‘abandonment’ can arise. What did happen was that the association asked its representatives in tlie various departments to discuss with tlie staffs tlie practicability or otherwise of the work being carried out and an indication of the numbers of staff who would possibly lie available for six, or seven months’ work, the idea being that volunteers should be limited in the main to senior officers who would not be eligible for war service. The junior officers as a group were therefore not regarded as eligible, cither by reason of the fact that tlie majority of them are engaged in nightly studies, which should not be interfered with for too long a period, are pending enlistments, or are already being called upon by their own departments to work some overtime. “Our temporary employees, too, are mostly attached to departments that . are working overtime in many cases . for four or five nights a week. This would naturally rob them of availability. In numbers of other departments the permanent staff is required to work overtime because of short- ■ ages of staff in their own departments, such shortages being occasioned by ■ transfers of officers to other departments that are carrying the full war : load, and by enlistments. These factors naturally narrow the field. “In spite of these drawbacks, com- ! bined with the fact that it is difficult for some married men to pin themselves down for seven months ahead, the association’s ‘feeler’ made abun dantly clear that a large number of public servants are ready and Mulling to make themselves available. In our ‘ view, however, taking all the circumstances into consideration, including the growing demands for overtime work within officers’ own departments, it is doubtful whether it would be practicable to compile the manpower ■ register efficiently and promptly wholly by part-time workers. ‘Apart from the particular groups that have been the subject of unwarranted adverse comment in the ‘Dominion,’ Wellington public servants as a whole are resentful of the reflections on their practical patriotism, particularly in view of the numerous enlistments from the service and of the Dominion-nude arrangements now In process of being made for voluntary contributions by way of monthly tieductions from salary to the National Patriotic Fund.” [Several correspondents have written expressing similar views to those of Mr. Miller.]