RAILWAY REORGANISATION

Evening Star, Issue 18045, 12 August 1922, Page 8

RAILWAY REORGANISATION

SOME BRITISH EXPERIENCES. ATTENTION TO MATTERS OF DETAIL Amongst several letters which the New Zealand) Welfare League has received bearing upon its efforts to secure reform in Public Service finance is one from a. correspondent who has had) experience on the staff of one of the English railway companies for a number of years. This correspondent writes as follows: BRITISH COMPANY’S EXPERIENCE. Dear sir, —In view of the great effort made by the Welfare League to bring about an improvement in the present conditions of the Now Zealand Railways, it has occurred to mo that a, few observations indicating the steps taken by a leading British railway to meet a similar situation might be of general interest, and perhaps also of some value to those engaged upon this very difficult problem. As the period of decontrol approached the companies sot out to , put their houses in order and prepare plans to meet the new conditions. The prices of materials were beyond 1 their control, and as salaries and) wages were governed by a sliding scale based upon the cost of living they could not be interfered with. The only alternative left to the companies was to investigate and overhaul the system of operation, and in the case of the company with which I was connected this work was carried out with great thoroughness and efficiency. It was decided to examine the whole structure from top to bottom down to the moot minute detail from the viewpoint of economy. For this purpose a number of Commissions were appointed, each to deal with a specific phase of the organisation within a certain well-defined district. These Commissions consisted of officials who were thoroughly conversant with the operations they investigated. Each member -had the subject for which he was best qualified'by his previous experiences. No Commissioner, however, dealt with the district to which ho belonged, and therefore was not called upon to criticise his own regular duties nor those of officials who in ordinary time were his superiors. The advantage of such an arrangement was obvious, and ensured to the Commissioner full freedom of action. The aims and objects of the inquiries were somewhat as follow: — (1) To sec that each employee was fully occupied. This was not the case in many instances, and the Commissioners were able to recommend reductions in staff by redistributing the duties. (2) To ensure that the whole of an employee’s duties were of a nature consistent with his pay. It was found that some men spent portions of their day perfoiming work which could bo done by a less-paid man or even by a youth. Redistribution on that basis would be made. (3) To arrange that provision was made to meet fluctuation in traffic by organising ihe staff on a more elastic basis. Sections wore combined, so that when an employee, through a decrease in traffic, was not fully occupied’ ho passed over to the assistance of oilier sections who had more than enough to do. This often happened in regard to the clerical staff. In' the old days clerical posts had become stereotyped and rigid, and the transfer of assistance from one pout to another was not easy. The Commissioners were able to improve situations of that kind, and thus prevented nn f increase oi staff which otherwise might 1 easily have taken place. I (4)‘ To discontinue duties hitherto per--1 formed when this could be done without detriment to the service. Most of there consisted of double and treble checks and audita which were really unnecessary. (5) To combine where practicable the dut’os of supervisors, mid releasing those no ioimcr required. For example, where (wo offices had each a chief supervision- and I an assistant, one chief was placed, in charge ' of both parties, and carried out the twin .duties with the help of the assistants. The other supervisor was placed mi the redundant list, and was available for service elsewhere. . . . , , (6) A special Commission investigated ! the use of mechanical _ appliances and the method of operation in vogue at each station. It should be remembered that seldom two stations are alike in structure and lay-out, and further differ in not handling ihe same kind of traffic. The methods a t each varied according to the ability or idosyncrasies of the local supervisor. It was. therefore necessary to see that the most economical system of operation was adopted in each locality. A groat improvement in station working followed the efforts of this Commission. 1 The correspondent adds that ‘‘ the result 'of the labors of these Commissions was : a revelation. I am not aware that any large and serious leakages were discovered, but the aggregate amount of the economies effected was astoundir§. It is possible that the same method, or .some modification of it, might be applied with beneficent reauhs to the New Zealand Railways.”—[Contributed by the New Zealand Welfare .League.] ___________