The New Zealand Times. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1913. DETECTIVES AND THEIR PAY

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVII, Issue 8365, 27 February 1913, Page 6

The New Zealand Times. THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1913. DETECTIVES AND THEIR PAY

A couple of weeks ago, in. approving in general terms the new regulations governing the administration of the police force, and congratulating the Hon. A. L. Herdman, the Minister of Justice, thereon, we expressed regret that the reward of police-constables was not increased as well as that of men higher in the service. In reply, Mr Herdnaan urged that constables are now fairly well paid, what with, their: wages, house allowance, and various extras, and that in any case it would cost £BOOO to have given them another sixpence a day, with corresponding increments to those in other grades which would bo involved. It now appears, however, that there are further aspects of the question to be ventilated. The detective branch of the service has received a decided set-back under the new scheme, and the men are naturally very sore indeed. It is to be feared that in his statement to the press concerning the new rates of pay and what they mean, the Minister was proceeding without that intimate knowledge which ho should have, and which wo do not doubt ho would prefer to possess. Mr Herdman said that chief detectives would remain at 16s 6d to 16s 6d per day; detective-ser-geants, now at 13s to 15s, would go up to 14a to 15s, by two increments of 6d per day for two years; while ordinary detectives, now getting 10s to 12s, would bo paid 10s 6d up, to 13s 6d by three increments of Is a day for every three years’_ service. Now, we find on examination of the facts that under the existing scale an ordinary detective—known technically, we believe, as a detective-constable —is paid 10s a day to begin with, rising in three-yearly increments of Is a day to 15s, which maximum is thus reached after fifteen years’ service. This is very different to the 10s to 12s stated by the Minister. The rate coming into opera-' tion on April Ist certainly gives a detective 6d a day more at the commencement, but at the end of nine years he reaches the high-water mark of 13s 6d instead of going on to 15s. This is surely an Irishman’s rise! The reason detectives are in future to start at 10s 6d instead of 10s is no doubt because in a number of offices actingdetectives are drawing higher pay than detectives. In other words, the revised scale is really to remove qn anomaly, and not to bring about an improved rate of pay, as inferred in the Ministerial statement. As to de-tective-sergeants, they, too, under existing conditions are paid 10s to 15s, not > 13s to 16s, as Mr Herdman has said, though they get an extra 6d a day house allowance —hut it takes ten years to reach the rank of sergeant. Moreover, the new regulations provide that a constable must serve eight years as an acting-detective before he can rank as a full-fledged detective and qualify for the wage allotted, whereas there has in the past been no such definite probationary period laid down, promotion depending upon merit rather than years of service. Another matter over which those concerned feel seriously aggrieved is that examinations will have to he passed in future to qualify for promotion in status and pay, and even then such preferment will only take place provided there are vacancies. As it is very many years since any of our detectives were at school, and there was but a fourth standard education demanded when they entered the force, they feel that tests of this character should not now be made. The men have made no preparation for examinations of the kind. Having not the slightest notion that they would ever bo called upon to show possession of the learning now required of them, they have not, so to speak, “ kept green.” Thus many a man who, by dint of energy, ability, and integrity, has worked himself up from the bottom of the ladder to a comparatively good position may find the way to further advancement closed to him because he left school at too early a period in life. To spring this upon men from forty to fifty years of age, or more, after the long and faithful service they have rendered the country, seems a most arbitrary proceeding. Even the average man of forty who left school with a good education would find it very awkward to be compelled to prepare for and face to-day a simple examination that, at one time, would have been quite easy to pass.

There is, we believe, a sense of injnstice and of strong resentment

throughout the whole of the detective branch of the service over these regulations. The men affected believe they are being treated very unfairly, especially in comparison with’ the rest of the force. It happens under the system that it will really pay a man, in frequent circumstances, much better not strive for the higher and far more difficult and dangerous sphere of labour. Detectives get none of those “ extras" Mr Herdman told us about that fall to the police, and are thus in many cases on lower pay than men beneath them in rank, although they are required to possess superior intelligence, initiative, courage, integrity, and discretion. It is asserted that seven constables who were recently promoted to be sergeants were junior in length of service to the majority of the detec-tive-constables, and even when, or if, the latter are promoted they will still bo behind the former in the list of sergeants. AVo do not know the rights and wrongs of this particular matter. It may have been necessary to make more police sergeants and not necessary to increase the number of detec-tive-sergeants. But we are convinced that the detectives as a whole feel that they are not receiving that measure of encouragement that the circumstances warrant, and that in any case the new scale of pay amounts in the end to a serious reduction.