HC Deb 18 June 1860 vol 159 cc568-71
MR. DIGBY SEYMOUR

rose to call the attention of the House to the position and pay of the Civil Assistants employed upon the Ordnance Survey, and more particularly to a portion of them, numbering about 700. Their complaint resolved itself into four distinct heads:—1. The insufficiency of pay as compared with that of the employés in other public departments. 2. The capriciousness of the mode of promotion in the Ordnance Survey, and the absence of any proper system of classification. 3. The absence of holidays, such as were allowed in other public Departments. 4. The hours of business, longer than in other establishments of the State. He had taken some trouble to put the Secretary of War in possession of the facts of the case, and had had the honour of receiving a lengthened reply; but as the right hon. Gentleman had not satisfied him, he wished to bring the matter under the notice of the House. He held in his hand a tabular list of the persons employed on the Ordnance Survey, and he found that the number of persons who received from 4s. to 6s. per day amounted to 145, and those who received from 2s. to 4s. per day amounted to 600, although their length of service averaged from 15 to 25 years. Between those two classes were the computers and draughtsmen—a large and most useful body. Taking the whole of the civil staff, the average pay was at the rate of 3s. 6d. a day; and, as they were not paid for Sundays, as the military staff were, taking 313 working days in the year, their average income amounted to less than £55 a year. When he turned to the military staff, he found that their incomes at an average rate of pay of 5s. a day amounted to £75 a year, and if the fuel and lodging provided were taken into account, the sapper on the military staff was much better off than the civil assistant. There were 496 persons on the military staff, and out of them 116 were superintendents, who performed no daily work whatever. The House would, he thought, be somewhat surprised at the proportion which the superintendents presented to the working staff. At Southampton there were sixty draughtsmen, and these had one captain, one lieutenant, one quarter-master-sergeant, one sergeant, and two corporals. There were thirty computers and fifty engravers, who had also a like proportion of officers as the draughtsmen. There were therefore a large number of officers, embracing lieutenant-colonels, majors, captains, lieutenants, sergeant-majors, &c, who presided over a number of persons who only amounted to about 140. The proportion between those who commanded and those who served in the military department was perfectly ridiculous. A few years ago, when the sanitary survey was being taken, a large proportion of civil assistants were employed, and they were all placed under the superintendence of two officers and two assistant-sergeants. Next look at the Topographical Office in London, where there were four commissioned and three non-commissioned officers superintending twenty-two persons, involving an expense which might be largely saved to the country. He would also ask the House to consider the position of these civil assistants as compared with other civil servants in the various departments of Somerset House. Messengers and porters received from £65 to £95 a year, and clerks commenced at £90. At the War Department the commencing salaries were £90; in the Customs, £80; and in the Long Boom, £75. It was clear, therefore, that these men en- gaged in the survey were not paid with anything like the same liberality as the Custom House and Somerset House civil clerks. In the case of these latter, moreover, there was a regular system of promotion according to merit; but in the case of those for whom he pleaded, the sergeant or corporal did as he pleased, and merit and long service had little chance of being regarded. And lastly, they had but fourteen days' holidays, while the civil service clerks had a month, and, at the same time, their daily labour was longer. He trusted on all these grounds, that the Government would take the case of these persons into consideration.

MR. VANCE

said, he could corroborate the general statements of the hon. and learned Gentleman the Member for Southampton. He wished to know whether those men were to be entitled to the benefits of the Civil Service Superannuation Act.

Mr. SIDNEY HERBERT

said, the hon. and learned Gentleman's statement was founded on an entire misconception as to the facts. In answer to his statement he would refer the House to the authentic Report of the number and cost of the men, civil and military, employed upon the Ordnance Survey, from which it would he seen that the real numbers did not tally with those given by his hon. and learned Friend. In calculating the cost of the military staff he had thrown in the cost of the superintending officers; but, in calculating that of the civil staff he had omitted the cost of supervision altogether. The best answer to his observations was, perhaps, the fact that the allowance made to civilians was sufficient at all times to secure an abundant supply of labour—that they never found men leaving the service, while there were always others anxious to obtain such employment, and upon the whole they were well paid. The hon. and learned Gentleman had quite misrepresented the fact as regarded the officers. If they had nothing to do but look after the men, it would be undoubtedly true that they were too numerous and overpaid; but so far from that being the case, they had enormous numbers of plans to inspect and manage, and were responsible for the expenditure of considerable sums annually. It should be remembered, in instituting any comparison between the allowances of soldiers and civilians, that the latter had only specified duties to perform, and were not liable to be removed at any mo- ment to some distant scene of war or to colonial service. It gave him great pleasure to find that he admitted the correctness and value of the survey, but he could assure him he was altogether mistaken in the case which he had submitted to the House. With regard to the duration of the holidays he had only to observe that those men had risen by their merit from the position of day labourers, and that there were very few people of their condition in life who could obtain even a fortnight's inaction every year.