BRITISH CIVIL SERVICE

Taranaki Daily News, 2 October 1929, Page 9

BRITISH CIVIL SERVICE

INQUIRY BY COMMISSION. British Official Wireless. Rugby, Sept. 30. The King has approved the appointment of a Royal Commission on the Civil Service under the chairmanship of Lord Tomlin. The 15 members include educational authorities and persons connected with public work, and five of them are women, namely, the Duchess, of Atholl, who is a Conservative member of Parliament, Mrs. Ayrton Gould, Mrs. Hamilton, a Labour member of Parliament, Mrs. Lowe and Mrs. Wintringham, the former a Liberal member of Parliament. The terms of reference are to inquire into and report on, firstly, the structure and organisation of the Civil Service, including that of recruitment; secondly, the conditions of the service with particular reference to the general standard of remuneration and the existing differentiation between the remuneration payable respectively to men and women civil servants and machinery for the discussion and settlement of questions relating to the conditions of the service and the position of civil servants in unestablished employment; thirdly, the conditions of retirement from the service, including the retirement of women civil servants on marriage. The commission is a gigantic undertaking, states one of the commissioners. The findings may affect hundreds of thousands. The terms of. reference have been framed to bring every matter of importance affecting the civil service within the limits of the inquiry, particularly the position of 75,000 women civil servants who have long been pressing for equal pay for equal work. Such a change will eost the country £3,000,000 annually. Some of tihe men’s organisations are afraid the principle bf equal pay will result in a general levelling down of salaries. The Morning Post describes the commission as an attempt to placate the trade union element of the Socialist Party. Ever since the general strike the civil service unions have agitated against the law preventing their partaking in political movements.