OVERTIME AND SWEATING.

Evening Post, Volume LVI, Issue 4, 5 July 1898, Page 2

OVERTIME AND SWEATING.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir — A short time ago a letter in your paper put a stop to overtime and sweating in the Government Buildings, but it has only been for a time. Overwork and sweating are again ia full swing, and iii ( one Department especially, which is becoming notorious for this sort of thing, the officers have been ordered to return to work for ,-an indefinite period, and which has every appearance of lasting for certainly not less than four to six months. As a sample of how this Department is managed (?) I understand that the work has been, during the last few years, increasing by leaps and bounds, whilst the deaths of some of the officers have adtled to the accumulation of work. No attempt worth the name has been made to. replace these officers or cope successful^ with the work, beyond putting in a small boy fresh from school, aud the transfer of an officer from the South, a gentleman with a large family, and who had been brought up at great expense, aud, being found absolutely incompetent, is being relegated to-the place from whence he came. This is a fair sample of how things are being carried on in the Government Buildings. The work in the offices i 3 accumulating, the staff is undermanned, underpaid, and compelled to work disgracefully long hours, and this whilst scores of clerks with wives and families are wandering aimlessly about j the streets. The Hail way Department is fast being run by children, whilst the other Government offices are being filled by girls. To suggest the employment of a casual or temporary hand in one of these offices is looked upon as a something worse crime thau that of employing a blackleg. Hoping some abler hand will take this up and secure relief to the officers concerned, I am, &c, A Hungry Clerk. Wellington, 2nd July, 1898.