TRAVEL ALLOWANCES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20924, 14 July 1931, Page 10

TRAVEL ALLOWANCES.

CIVIL SERVICE POSITION. APPLYING THE REDUCTION. The purpose of the schedule of travelling allowances, overtime rates and lodging and relieving payments for public servants gazetted last week is to bring the existing regulations, last amended in November, 1924, into conformity with the provisions of the Finance Act, 1931, reducing salaries •and allowances in the Civil Service by 10 per cent. For the purposes of the cut all such allowances are included within the term salary. Incidentally, the Gazette notice removes a somewhat serious anomaly. The scale of allowances varies in accordance with different grades of pay, and when, as frequently happened, the 10 per cent, reduction brought a man into the next, lower grade then his allowances suffered a double cut—first the reduction arising from his being placed in a lower grade, and then the 10 per cent, cut on that lower rate. An actual instance will mako clear the position. A field officer drawing £4OO received 15s a day travelling allowance. The 10 per cent, reduction to £360 brought him into the £145-£3 BO class, for which the daily allowance is 12s 6d. From this 12s 6d a further deduction of 10 per cent, was made, 60 that in all his daily allowance was reduced frbm 15s to lis 3d. Under the new regulations the allowance in his grade is fixed at 13s 6d and a cut of 10 per cent, only provided for. The old grading limits were £145, £3BO, £470 and £565. These have been reduced by 10 per cent, in each case to £l3O 10s, £342, £423 and £SOB 10s, and the corresponding allowance has also been reduced by 10 per cent., calculation being made to the nearest 6cl.

Some complaint is being made that travelling allowances now are not always sufficient in the lower grades to meet the actual out-of-pocket expenses. In at least ono instance the difficulty was overcome by a superior officer drawing a higher allowance undertaking a journey of several hundred miles in place of his subordinate, who would have been out of pocket if he had had to make the trip. The higher official was just able to "come out square."