ENGINEERING STAFF.

Waikato Times, Volume 111, Issue 18652, 2 June 1932, Page 3

ENGINEERING STAFF.

OF BOROUGH COUNCIL. COMPARISONS OF EXPENDITURE. The borough engineer, Mr R. Worley. at 'the meeting of the Borough Council last evening submitted a report on the. staff in his department over several years, of which the following is an extract: — “Activities were commenced on the big loan expenditure late in 1921 and the first complete year’s figures available are <o.r 1922-23.” the report stated. “Up till 1925 the waterworks department was under the electrical engineer, .since then it has been under my charge. “it should he realised that much of my time and that of my staff is oi necessity taken up attending to the requirements of the public checking and allocating accounts and preparing information and reports for the council regardless of whether loan works or capital works are being prosecuted or not. Furthermore the nature of our water supply demands more technical supervision than the average municipal water department, a factor which must he given due consideration. Against this, however, we have considerably less capital expenditure. “ Different classes of engineering work vary 'Considerably in the stall requirements and in some cases it is necessary to spend considerable sums by way of staff salaries a year or more ahead of the period in which the work is actually carried out; for instance assistance in preparing the design ol the reservoir which was not built until the 1930-32 period. I can state definitely that such careful pre-planning was productive of over ten times its cost in tiie nett result of the work. Summary of Years. " It will he apparent from the foregoing that there can be no definite relation between the staff expenditure and the total expenditure in any one year. It is necessary to view the_ results over a period of years to gain a true impression and for this reason i give below a summary of the figures set out above.

An Engineer's Functions. “Tiie engineer has two main functions to perform. Firstly to carry out all works in such a manner that in technical detail they are sound and comply with the accepted principles of engineering and the latest information available, .secondly to carry out such works at the minimum of cost. The average layman could probably carry out most of the works we engage in but whereas a skilled staff can keep the total costs down to the minimum consistent with safety, the unskilled man is quite unable to do so and it is essentially this fact which makes imperative' the employment of an efficient and numerically sufficient engineering staff. When these facts are ignored the total cost of the works (including staff expenditure) goes up, and up at a much greater ratio than 'is represented by the saving in •the staff costs. No one could be more keen than I am at keeping the council’s costs to the minimum. As borough engineer that is essentially my job and the council can be assured that it will receive advice from mo the moment I can sec that a further reduction in staff will result in reduced total expenditure."

Year No. on staff .staff salaries total expend. 1922/23 14 £ 3845 £ 77150 1923/24 17 4553 143043 1924/25 17 4418 143130 1925/26 12 2987 93680 192G/27 12. 3215 76784 1927/28 12 3335 55693 1928/29 9 2485 32059 1929/30 9 2683 40872 1930/31 10 2912 70248 1931/32 10 2850 50665