§ MR. ARTHUR O'CONNOR,who had given Notice of a Motion—
That the practice of appointing clerks of the Treasury Office, and other gentlemen who have acted as private secretaries to Prime Ministers and Chancellors of the Exchequer, to important posts in Departments of the Civil Service other than the Treasury, is calculated to discourage zeal and industry in such Departments to the prejudice of the Public Service,said: Being precluded by the Forms of the House from moving the Resolution which stands in my name on the Paper, I rise now for the purpose of calling attention to the question, which is a very important one. I wish to disclaim, at the very outset, any desire to make any special attack upon the present Administration, because I am not aware that the practice which I ask the House to disapprove is followed by the Ministers who are now in power more than it has been followed by any of their Predecessors. Under all Governments it has been pretty much the same. My present object is not to blame or to disparage the Members of any Government, past or present, however much I may he, upon other grounds, opposed to a particular Administration. Still less do I wish to make an attack upon any of the gentlemen who have been exceptionally promoted, or to detract in any degree from the reputation they have acquired for more than ordinary strength of character, ability, and zeal. I am very ready to admit that they may all be considerably above the average. In fact, it is obvious that they must be able and qualified men; the interest of the Ministers themselves secures that in the selection of Private Secretaries they will have regard to those qualities of readiness and dispatch in business, tact, urbanity and firmness, and a certain aptitude for administrative work, which are all of the first importance in the direction of a Department, and without which they would scarcely be efficient assistants to a hard-worked Minister. There is, therefore, no question of their character or their qualifications; and the Motion 1729 which I placed upon the Paper was intended to be far removed from anything of a personal nature. I desired to bring it forward solely in the interest of the Civil Service, with which for years I was myself connected, and in which I must always take a lively interest. The Civil Service Departments may be divided into two great classes—the first class, comprising the Departments of Secretaries of State, which may be called the administrative and spending Departments; the other class, including the Revenue Departments of Customs and Inland Revenue, which are not presided over by Secretaries of State. Intermediate between these two classes is the Post Office, which partakes of the character of both, being at once a Revenue and a spending Department. And over all is the Treasury, the centre of administration and of patronage. The Departments of the first class are strong and influential; strong in the fact that their own Chiefs are Cabinet Ministers, able to protect the interests of their subordinates, and influential from the social position and connections of large numbers of their members. These Departments have, accordingly, little to complain of in consequence of the practice to which I refer. On the contrary, they sometimes, but only occasionally, receive some of those undue advantages of which the Treasury itself keeps the lion's share. A case in point, which. I mention only incidentally, is that of Mr. Mitford, a clerk in the Home Office of 12 or 13 years' service, but who, having acted for some time as Private Secretary to the right hon. and learned Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department (Sir William Harcourt), was appointed by him, some six weeks ago, to be a Commissioner of Prisons, and the colleague of an experienced officer, Admiral Hornby, to the exclusion and discouragement of experienced Inspectors and Governors. The Home Office, therefore, does not suffer much, neither does the Admiralty, the Colonial Office, or the War Office; although there was a case in connection with the War Office, not many years ago, which gave rise to a discussion in this House. The Post Office, again, is able to offer a considerable resistance to any outrageous encroachments upon its own field attempted by anyone outside the Treasury. Thus, when some years ago the noble 1730 Marquess, now the Secretary of State for India (the Marquess of Hartington), but formerly Postmaster General, after having been Under Secretary of State for War, attempted to appoint Mr. Hobart, a junior in the War Office, who was his Private Secretary, to one of the most lucrative postmasterships in the Kingdom, the design had to be given up. But when the encroachment is made by the Treasury itself, the Post Office sees its best prizes snatched away from its own officers, and given to junior outsiders. But the Customs and Inland Revenue Departments are still less influential, and their Chiefs are not Cabinet Ministers. The appointments they offer to the rapacity of outsiders are more numerous and more tempting to those who can strongly influence the actions of the chief Ministers of the Treasury; and these Departments, accordingly, are the principal sufferers. But these Departments are also the largest; and the discontent engendered by appointments such as I refer to is more extensively propagated, and, in its effects, more generally injurious to the Civil portion of the Public Service. Let me now give the most prominent cases of Private Secretaries of Ministers who have been appointed to posts of profit in the Civil Service. What are these appointments? I will content myself with a limited number of them; all notable cases, and all still in being. They are Mr. Herbert Murray, who was a clerk in the Treasury and Private Secretary to a Chancellor of the Exchequer, and who was appointed Assistant Paymaster General and a Queen's Remembrancer in Ireland, and is now Secretary of Customs, at a salary of£1,400 a-year; Mr. Algernon West, Private Secretary to Mr. Gladstone, Prime Minister, appointed Commissioner of Inland Revenue, and recently promoted to be Chairman of that Board—salaries,£1,200 and£2,000; Mr. Walter S. Northcote, who was not in the Civil Service at all, but was Private Secretary to Sir Stafford Northcote, when the right hon. Gentleman was Chancellor of the Exchequer, appointed Commissioner of Inland Revenue—salary,£1,200 a-year; Mr. Charles G. Turner, a clerk in the Treasury, appointed Accountant and Comptroller General of Inland Revenue—salary,£1,000 a-year; Mr. Stevenson Arthur Blackwood, a clerk in 1731 the Treasury, appointed Secretary to the General Post Office—salary,£2,000 a-year; Mr. Algernon Turner, clerk in the Treasury and Private Secretary to Lord Beaconsfield, Prime Minister, appointed Assistant Secretary at the General Post Office—salary,£1,500 a-year; Mr. (now Sir) Rivers Wilson, clerk in the Treasury and Private Secretary to Mr. Lowe, Chancellor of the Exchequer, appointed Controller of the National Debt—salary,£1,800 a-year; Mr. C. W. Fremantle, clerk in the Treasury and Private Secretary to Mr. Disraeli, Chancellor of the Exchequer, appointed Deputy Master of the Mint—salary,£1,200 a-year; and Mr. C. L. Ryan, who was a clerk in the Treasury and Private Secretary to the present Prime Minister, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer, was appointed to the post of Assistant Controller and Auditor General, with a salary of£1,500 a-year. I do not wish to canvas any of these appointments; but, in order to show what may he said as to some of them. I may mention that, in regard to Mr. Ryan, he was not originally in the Treasury, but was in the Audit Office, and was not transferred to the Treasury for promotion, but was made Private Secretary. Whether he was an efficient Private Secretary or not, it is not for me to inquire; but he was afterwards appointed to the post of Assistant Controller over the heads of a considerable number of very efficient men, under whom he had previously served in a very subordinate capacity, to do very inferior work, and he was appointed, notwithstanding a protest sent in to the Treasury by these officers. The House will readily understand that Members of the Civil Service, knowing my own quondam connection with it, and knowing that they may, with perfect confidence and safety, make to me any communication they think fit as to their grievances—knowing, also, I am at least as well able to appreciate them as any other Member of the House, and that no man is more qualified to enter into them, or more desirous of having them removed—knowing this, they have, during the last two years, sent an immense number of representations to me. I have never been on the look-out for grievances. One has enough to do, in all conscience, without that; neither have I put forward a complaint at any 1732 time without having first assured myself that it was well founded. I think I may claim credit from the House for not having unnecessarily put forward any grievance in connection with the Service, unless it was clearly my duty to do so. When, the year before last, and again last year, I made some observations upon the Customs Department, I knew very well how well founded was that dissatisfaction which has now at last forced itself upon public attention, and is now known to the whole of the House, with regard to the re-organization attempted on its Staff. But when the hon. Member for Hull (Mr. Norwood) brought forward the grievances of the Outport Officers, though I appreciated fully the hardship of their position, I contented myself with a silent vote, and did not address one single word to the House upon the matter, because I saw that it was unnecessary, as it was in perfectly safe hands. But with regard to the matter to which I now wish to draw the attention of the House, I do feel that it is my duty to appeal, not to the Government, and not to the ex-Ministers, but to the House of Commons generally, and to declare, from my own knowledge and experience in the Service, that these appointments of specially-favoured individuals, however high their qualifications, to the best posts in Departments where they have never served, and over the heads of all the Staff of those Departments, produce evil effects, which it may be difficult exactly to define, but which are none the less real, and none the less injurious. Now, Sir, I have alluded to a number of these appointments, and I might have doubled the list if I had thought fit. It is obvious that each such appointment must necessarily produce great discontent, heartburning, and disappointment in the Department invaded. If the promoters had gone within the Department itself, not one man alone would have been advanced, but through every grade below him an official would have risen in his turn, and a healthy tone would have been imparted to the entire office, with that stimulus to exertion which the sight of fair promotion is always calculated to engender. But with the introduction of an outsider from the Treasury, you have first a disappointed man in the person immediately superseded, you have discontent at every step 1733 in the ladder below him, where men have been baulked of anticipated promotion, and you have a sense of injustice permeating that branch of the Service which naturally tends to render the entire Staff sullen and inert. The Treasury Staff secures the whole advantage, for the man removed from Downing Street obtains for himself extraordinary advancement, and his removal secures an improvement in the position of all below him on the Treasury list. It will, Sir, be in the recollection of many hon. Members of this House that during the last Parliament the House was invited, on the Motion of the hon. Member for Hackney (Mr. John Holms), to express its opinion upon an individual case somewhat akin, but not altogether on all fours, with the case to which I allude. At that time Lord Beaconsfield saw fit to appoint a junior from the War Office to the headship of the Stationery Office—I mean Mr. Pigott. Knowing Mr. Pigott personally, I was, for his own sake, glad of his advancement, and congratulated him upon it, and I claimed for Mr. Pigott the well-earned credit of having acquitted himself singularly well in a difficult and responsible post. But the hon. Member for Hackney would have been inclined, if he had been a friend of Mr. Pigott's, to congratulate him also, and he probably would have been ready to give that gentleman the credit which is his due. But the terms of the hon. Member's Motion were—That the recent appointment of Controller of Her Majesty's Stationery Office is calculated to diminish the…interest and zeal of officials employed in the Public Departments of the State.The hon. Member pointed out that Mr. Pigott had been Private Secretary to several Under Secretaries of State, and denounced the appointment as unfair to the country, and unfair to the Civil Service. The hon. Member for Wenlock (Mr. A. Brown), in seconding the Motion, said that the appointment must tend to discourage all those gentlemen who had been superseded, and could not be for the benefit of the Public Service. It fell to the Chancellor of the Exchequer of that day to say what he could in defence of his Chief. With regard to the personal qualifications of Mr. Pigott, he had not a very difficult task; but he went on to contend on the general question that— 1734It was not a necessary rule that promotion must always take place within each Department, and reasons might easily he. suggested why a man might be advantageously brought in from another Department. He would come with a fresh mind, and bring a fresh eye to bear on any abuses which might exist."—[3 Hansard, ccxxxv. 1338.]I am prepared to admit that there is a great deal of force and a certain amount of truth in that statement; but what did the right hon. Gentleman the present Secretary of State for War (Mr. Childers) say in reply? Mr. Childers said—I quote from Hansard—That he was not at all disposed to regard the affair from the point of view of the right hon. Gentleman opposite (the Chancellor of the Exchequer). At a time when they were doing their best to improve the status of the Civil Servants, it would be an unfortunate course to adopt, and altogether a departure from sound principle and common practice, if they were to say to men who had nearly reached the top of the tree:—'No matter how long your services, or how great your efficiency may be, you will not be promoted to the headship of your Department, but we shall take a junior clerk out of another office who knows nothing about the business and appoint him over you, in order to have the advantage of a fresh mind.'He went on to say—He did not know how far that doctrine might be carried; but if a man was to be appointed, not because of his knowledge and experience, but because he came from somewhere else, and knew nothing of the particular business he would have to discharge, then, indeed, it would be a sorry look-out for the members of the Civil Service, who entered through the painful door of Competitive Examination in the hope that if they did their duty they would be promoted to the highest offices in the Department in which they were placed."—[Ibid., 1339–40.]Such were the sentiments of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War then, and such are his sentiments now. His action in respect of recent promotions in the War Office has been in accordance with them. Throughout that debate it was unanimously admitted that Mr. Pigott's character was of the highest; there was no imputation upon it, and no one questioned that his abilities were equal to his character. The House of Commons did not consider that question at all. It put it aside, and the decision was arrived at upon totally different grounds. The Motion of the hon. Member for Hackney was carried against the Government. And why was it carried? It was carried 1735 because the general sense of the House was that the appointment was given not altogether because of the qualifications of Mr. Pigott, high as they might be, but also because, over and above that, there were some kind of relations of a personal or political character between Lord Beaconsfield and Mr. Pigott or that gentleman's family, and that, but for these relations, the appointment would not have been made. Lord Beaconsfield afterwards, in his place in the House of Lords, made an explanatory statement, and emphatically denied that any such relations existed. On that explanation, and solely and only because of that contradiction, this House, with a loyalty and generous promptitude which did it honour, rescinded the vote. The House on that occasion was not only loyal and generous, but its position was strictly logical and as simple as a syllogism. Such a syllogism reduced to the simplest form would be: The appointment of a gentleman to the headship of an important office, in which he has not served, over the heads of the Staff of that Department, if made on account of his personal relations with the Minister in whose gift the appointment lies, is calculated to diminish the interest and zeal of officials employed in Public Departments of the State. That is the major premiss. The minor was this. Mr. Pigott was so appointed to be Controller of the Stationery Office. This the House accepted on the representation of the hon. Member for Hackney; and, having so accepted it, the House drew the logical conclusion in the shape of the Resolution which the hon. Member submitted. But when it was shown, as Lord Beaconsfield showed, that the minor premiss was false, the House properly abandoned its conclusion, and rescinded its vote. But what I want to point out is this—that it never abandoned its major premiss, and that, if Mr. Pigott had been Lord Beaconsfield's own Private Secretary, such a defence could not have been made, and the vote would have stood. I take it, therefore, that the vote on that occasion may be regarded as a proof that the House is prepared to condemn any such appointments, which would not have been made if the recipient of the benefit had not stood in some close personal relation to the Minister in whose gift the appoint- 1736 ment lay. Now, there voted on that occasion, in support of the Motion of the hon. Member for Hackney, as shown by the Division List—the Hon. Evelyn Ashley, Mr. Thomas Brassey, the Right Hon. John Bright, Lord Frederick Cavendish, Mr. Joseph Chamberlain, Leonard H. Courtney, Sir Charles W. Dilke, the Right Hon. John G. Dodson, Henry Fawcett, Sir Charles Forster, the Right Hon. W. E. Forster, Sir William Harcourt, Arthur Divett Hayter, Sir Henry James, Lord Kensington, G. Osborne Morgan, Anthony J. Mundella, the Right Hon. Dr. Lyon Playfair, and George Otto Trevelyan. Now, Sir, that was in the last Parliament, of which I was not a Member, and, therefore, I cannot be supposed to know anything about the individuality of the persons to whom these names belong; but the list induces me to think that many present occupants of the Treasury Bench are not altogether indisposed to give a mental adhesion to the principle of my Motion. But, Sir, it may be said by those who do not agree with the majority of the present Ministry with reference to some of their appointments, that the gentlemen promoted had served as Private Secretaries to successive Ministers of different Parties, and that, therefore, no charge of undue partiality can be brought against the Minister who actually makes the beneficial appointment, because he is promoting a gentleman who occupied the same post with regard to his Predecessor as he did with regard to himself. But I may point out that any man who makes use of that argument—and it has been made use of on former occasions—by so doing entirely misses the force of the complaint which is made. It has absolutely nothing to do with the question. What matters it to the Staff of the Customs that the man who takes the prize of their Department has been Private Secretary first to one Minister and then another? Tory patronage or Liberal patronage, it is all one to them if the Treasury Staff is benefited always at their expense. Then, again, we may be told that these gentlemen are all singularly able men, and specially qualified beyond others for the posts to which they are translated. But, surely, we are not expected to believe—and I hope the House will not believe, and I am certain the Civil Service will not 1737 believe—that, from some unexplained and mysterious cause, one Department is so provided with an abnormally gifted Staff, that from its own ranks it is able to furnish a regular and constant supply of officials pre-eminently fitted to occupy all the most lucrative posts in other Departments, while not a single instance can be adduced of a junior of the Customs or Inland Revenue Department being recognized as so gifted as to be fit for preferment to the Treasury itself. No, Sir; however gifted an officer in the Inland Revenue Department may be, however long and faithful his service, however fully qualified he may be, by work and experience, to obtain one of the prizes which he is legitimately entitled to hope for, he must be a man of marvellously sanguine temperament if he does not find his zeal chilled and his assiduity clogged by the consciousness that when within reach of his goal he may be called upon to place his knowledge and his capacity at the command of a junior from the Treasury, who, with half his service and none of his special experience, will supplant him in the post which he has fairly earned. It was well remarked, some three weeks ago, in an article in The Times newspaper, that—The mere sense that years of labour and application may, and probably will, go for nothing in procuring promotion to the highest posts is the most serious damper to departmental zeal that can well be imagined.That is the result of my experience. I scarcely like to refer to a third argument—for it scarcely deserves the name of argument—in favour of some of these appointments; but I allude to it because it will possibly be put forward on this occasion—namely, that the man who has passed the whole of his service in one Department is sure to have his favourite hangers-on and favourites, who will be certain to establish a clique around him, which will influence promotion for the benefit of themselves or their friends. It is scarcely worth mentioning at all; but, I would answer, it is precisely this cliqueism of the Treasury that we object to; and, besides, an outsider is just as likely to be swayed by his likings and dislikings as another, while he cannot possibly be so well able to form a correct judgment of the qualifications of his subordinates as that man can who has watched their career for years. If 1738 cliqueism is what it is necessary to prevent, it is very much more necessary to prevent it in the Treasury than in any other Department. Cliqueism in a Department may produce evils, and unquestionably it has done so; but the evils produced by a clique in a Department are confided to the Department itself, whereas cliqueism in the Treasury extends its baneful influences all over the Services. In dealing with this question, I have been told that I am dealing with a difficult and a delicate question. I have endeavoured to avoid the least expression which might be calculated to irritate or provoke anything of personal feeling; and if I have made use of any expression calculated to produce such an effect, I have done so unwittingly. I have brought forward the matter, not for the purpose of attacking any Minister, or of offending any gentleman who may have been previously promoted; but solely in the interest of the Public Service. I have pointed out that the Treasury clerks who have acted as Private Secretaries are apparently endowed with abilities far exceeding those of all other clerks and Private Secretaries in the Public Service. It is a good thing for a young man in the Treasury, when a good post falls vacant, to be Private Secretary to a Minister, and to have his merits recognized; but it is not necessarily for the good of the Public Service that he should be rewarded with the prize post of another Department. It is a practice which has produced evil effects in the past, and must continue to produce evil effects as long as it is continued. I appeal, therefore, to the House of Commons—not to the present Ministry, but to the House of Commons—at least to do their duty in providing safeguards for our great Public Departments, and, by so doing, promoting the general interests of the public.
§ MR. WARTONsaid, he had no intention of following the hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. Arthur O'Connor) into all he had said upon the subject, because he was quite prepared to admit that, with regard to both political Parties, very much the same system was pursued in reference to these appointments, and neither Party could reproach the other as to the course that was taken. The Government were now engaged in dealing with corrupt practices at elections, with a view of rendering electoral 1739 contests more pure in future; and they were imposing heavy penalties upon venal candidates and agents. Yet it nevertheless appeared that they practised analogous arts themselves in the distribution of patronage. His object, however, in rising was not to enter into the cases which had been submitted to the House by the hon. Member; but rather to call attention to a matter that occurred a very short time ago. He had no doubt that it was sometimes possible to find in a Department a man fitted for any place—a man of super-eminent ability, who was naturally fitted to fill any position. There was, however, an Order in Council which provided for the promotion of these extraordinary geniuses, so that their services should not be lost to the public. He referred to the Order in Council dated 4th of June, 1870, in reference to promotion in the Civil Service; and the 7th Rule of that Order was as follows:—
In ease the Chief of a Department to which a situation belongs, and the Lords of the Treasury shall consider that the qualifications in respect of knowledge and ability deemed requisite for such situation are wholly or in part professional, or otherwise peculiar, and not ordinarily to be acquired in the Civil Service, and the said Chief of the Department shall propose to appoint thereto a person who has acquired such qualifications in other pursuits, and in case the said Chief of the Department and the Lords of the Treasury shall consider that either for the purpose of facilitating transfers from the Redundant List, or for other reason, it would be for the public interest that examination should he wholly or partially dispensed with, the Civil Service Commissioners may dispense with examination, wholly or partially, and may grant their certificate of qualification upon evidence satisfactory to them that the said person possesses the requisite knowledge and ability, and is duly qualified in respect of age, health, and character.He had felt it his duty, in the month of February last, to call attention, by a Question to the right hon. Gentleman the Postmaster General, to an appointment made by him of a gentleman who had been acting in the capacity of Private Secretary to himself. That person had been appointed, in defiance of all the safeguards provided by this Rule—a person neither qualified by age, nor distinguished by ability, and not in the Public Service at all, to a position in the Post Office. If hon. Members would look at the Rule he had just read, they would see at once how far the Postmaster General, in making this appoint- 1740 ment, had obeyed the only Rule which could shield him from the charge of improper favouritism. The individual in question certainly did not come under the first part of the Rule or Order. There was neither any wonderful amount of knowledge or ability possessed by the gentleman who was appointed by the Postmaster General; and if it was for the public interest that an examination should be wholly or in part dispensed with, surely it was necessary that there should be some qualification as to age and so forth. Yet this person was considerably beyond the specified age, and possessed neither the qualification of ability, public service, or age. He (Mr. Warton) had put a Question to the Postmaster General on the subject, and the only answer he received was that he did not know what the age of the gentleman was. But there were hon. Members who recollected what Ministers said from time to time, and who occasionally brought them to book at a moment when it was not quite convenient to be reminded of their former statements. He had considered it his duty to move for a Return of the age of the gentleman who had obtained exemption from the stipulations of the Rule laid down in 1870. The Return was granted as far back as February last; but the Minister had not chosen to comply with it, and no steps had been taken to produce it.
§ LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISHThe hon. and learned Member who has just sat down (Mr. Warton) has kindly stated that he is ready to make every allowance, both to the present and to any other Government, for the difficult circumstances under which they are required to exercise their political patronage. I regret very much that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister is not present to answer any attack which may be made upon him in regard to this particular question; and I can assure the House that the absence of my right hon. Friend is not intentional, but that it is simply owing to the fact that he did not expect that this question was likely to come on. I hold that no function of a Minister of State is more important than the exercise of the higher class of patronage in connection with appointments in the Civil Service, because the efficiency of the Civil Service depends mainly upon the character of the appointments which are made. From time to time these ap- 1741 pointments have been called in question, It is perfectly proper that that should be the case, and that, if necessary, the person who has made them should be held strictly responsible and called to account. But I would venture to say that of all the appointments which have been made by the present Government, those which have been made by the Prime Minister, although I am not here to speak upon his behalf, are the least open to any challenge whatever. The hon. and learned Member opposite (Mr. Warton) has thought fit to make an attack upon my right hon. Friend the Postmaster General for an appointment which he has made in the Post Office, in connection with a gentleman who had previously occupied the position of his Private Secretary. It will scarcely be credited that the appointment thus called in question was not one of any important character whatever, but simply to a subordinate clerkship in the Post Office. I think I shall be perfectly within the recollection of the House, when I say that, after the explanation of my right hon. Friend the Postmaster General (Mr. Fawcett), the hon. and learned Member for Bridport (Mr. Warton) is alone the hon. Member who continues to regard the appointment as unsatisfactory. I think there are very few Members of this House who will be of opinion that the faithful services rendered by the gentleman in question to my right hon. Friend the Postmaster General did not deserve the small recognition which they have received. As I have said, the patronage of the higher class appointments in the Civil Service is a very important question. I fully recognize the force of the observation of the hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. A. O'Connor), that it is discouraging to any branch of the Civil Service to find that they have been deprived of their well-deserved hopes of advancement. But the appointments which have been made in the Inland Revenue Department show that the Prime Minister is by no means insensible to that consideration. For instance, the appointment of the present very able Vice Chairman of the Board of Inland Revenue has, for the first time, placed a man who has fought his way from the very bottom of the Service in that responsible and important position. It is even more important still, than any other considera- 1742 tion that can be named, that the best man should be selected for such a post. The hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. A. O'Connor) has, at some length, dwelt on what he considers the unfair proportion of lucrative posts which have been awarded for political services to gentlemen connected with the Treasury. I was somewhat surprised that the hon. Gentleman did not illustrate his remarks by a reference to the Treasury itself; but it is a remarkable fact that for many years the Treasury has not had at the head of its own permanent Department a Member selected from the Treasury itself. Sir Ralph Lingen is not a Treasury man; his immediate predecessor, Mr. Hamilton, was not a Treasury man; and Sir Charles Trevelyan, who was the predecessor of Mr. Hamilton, was not a Treasury man. The reason of this has been that the head of the Treasury has felt that it was a most important object to obtain, in this responsible position, the man who was the best man for the Office; and, therefore, the Government of the day has altogether disregarded what the hon. Member has spoken of as the natural feeling of the Department in looking forward to promotion. I could illustrate the course which has been pursued still further; but I do not think that it is really necessary. The hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. A. O'Connor) adverted at considerable length to the harm which he said was effected by Mr. Pigott's appointment; and he has called attention to the Resolution which was passed by this House in reference to that appointment, a Resolution in favour of which I myself voted. Now, that appointment was of a most important nature, and the accusation which was made was that it was conferred not on account of service or ability, but because of the close personal relationship which existed between the Minister by whom it was made and the individual on whom it was conferred. I am not ashamed of the vote which I gave in favour of the Resolution. It appears to me to have been a most reasonable vote, if the appointment was made simply on account of personal relationship. Under such circumstances, I hold that such an appointment would be a bad appointment. At the' same time, I do not hold that it is necessarily a bad appointment because the man appointed happens to have a 1743 personal relationship with the Minister by whom the appointment is made. Personal relationship should, by no means, be a matter of disqualification; but the appointment should be fairly judged upon its merits, and upon its merits solely. I do not think, after the explanations that were made, that the appointment really came within the terms of the Resolution which was subsequently passed by this House, and afterwards rescinded. It appears to me that the hon. Member has also been inconsistent in the treatment of the case of Mr. Herbert Murray. It so happens that Mr. Herbert Murray never bad any personal relationship whatever with the Prime Minister. I believe that Mr. Murray was not even known to the Prime Minister, except by reputation as one of the most able of the members of the Civil Service.
§ MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORI hope the noble Lord will excuse me if I interrupt him. I did not ground anything upon the particular appointment of Mr. Herbert Murray. I only mentioned his case incidentally with other appointments.
§ LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISHThen I have some difficulty in following the hon. Gentleman, because I certainly understood him to complain of the appointment of Mr. Herbert Murray. I understood him to complain that Mr. Herbert Murray, not having belonged to the Department to which be was appointed, had been selected over the heads of other Civil Servants; and all I have to say is, that I do not see how the Prime Minister could have been actuated by improper partiality towards Mr. Herbert Murray, seeing that he had had no previous acquaintance with him. The appointment was made for this reason, and this reason only—that, able as the officers of the Customs are, as there were important changes in view, it was considered desirable to have a man from the outside, who should be able to view the difficult questions under consideration from a different standpoint from one who had been brought up in the Department. And I venture to say that the appointment will be justified before long. The hon. Gentleman has complained not only of appointments from the Treasury generally, but of the appointment's of Private Secretaries. The idea that Private Secretaries are gentlemen appointed 1744 simply because they are connections or friends of the Minister is an antiquated one, and has long since been exploded. So very much of the personal convenience of the Minister, and of the possibility of his discharging his duties, depends upon his appointing the man best fitted for the post, and best qualified to aid in the discharge of the duties of the Department, that such appointments can no longer be called in question. The Minister who has the appointment to make naturally looks out, in his own interest and convenience, for the best man he can get. I will take the case of a gentleman to whom the hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. A. O'Connor) has referred—Mr. West. Mr. West, when he was first appointed by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister as his Private Secretary, was not in the Treasury; but he was simply selected for the office of Private Secretary because, from all my right hon. Friend could learn, he was the man best fitted for the post. He discharged his duties in the most able manner, and, having proved himself to be so thoroughly qualified for that position, he was made a Commissioner of the Board of Inland Revenue; and when the post of Vice Chairman of the Board became vacant, he had so well performed his duties that Lord Beaconsfield, who had had no connection with him in a private capacity, appointed him to the vacancy.
§ MR. ARTHUR O'CONNORLord Beaconsfield refused for a long time to promote Mr. West.
§ LORD FREDERICK CAVENDISHThe hon. Member is very ingenious in discovering a discrepancy with regard to the facts. I venture to say that anyone who knows anything about the working of the Department is fully aware that the reason why Mr. West was promoted to the Vice Chairmanship was, that he was looked upon as the best man for the post, and I will add that the appointment has been amply justified by the services which Mr. West has since rendered. I have already said that it is well Ministers should be called to account for the manner in which they discharge the important function of exercising patronage in regard to high appointments. The names which the hon. Member has read out contain those of some of the most able members of the 1745 Civil Service; and they afford convincing proof that the high function of patronage has, at any rate, in their case, neither been disgraced nor badly discharged. The hon. Member has referred to the case of Mr. Ryan. I appeal to every hon. Member who has sat upon the Public Accounts Committee to say how the important duties which fall to the lot of Mr. Ryan have been discharged. It would be absolutely impossible to obtain a better man. I could go through the other names which have been referred to by the hon. Member—Mr. Fremantle, Mr. Rivers Wilson, Mr. Stevenson Blackwood, and others—but all I will say is, that the Ministers who appointed them ought to be proud of having done so, and that there is nothing to regret or be ashamed of in appointing them.
§ MR. W. H. SMITHsaid, he wished to offer a few words in confirmation of the view which the noble Lord (Lord Frederick Cavendish) had expressed. It had been his duty for some time to act as Secretary to the Treasury; and when he arrived at the Department he found it necessary to select a Private Secretary from amongst gentlemen in the office. This gentleman was, to all appearances, adverse in politics to himself, but possessed the best qualifications for the appointment—that was to say, great experience and knowledge of the office, added to a spirit of loyalty to the Department and to the State. It was urged that the Administration might suffer from the Party politics of gentlemen appointed to these offices; but, with his experience in administration, he could say that in his Department, no matter what the politics of gentlemen might be, their one desire and object was to serve the State and their superiors in office with vigour, loyalty, and perfect diligence. During the four or five years that he was Secretary to the Treasury, he was served, and the Exchequer and the State were likewise served, by a gentleman of the highest possible credit in the position which he then occupied—a gentleman who was since promoted to the position of Secretary to the Governor General of India. This gentleman was no sympathizer with any of his (Mr. W. H. Smith's) political views, but was, on the contrary, his political opponent; but, notwithstanding that, he served, him with fidelity as Private Secretary, in 1746 which capacity he regarded him not so much as he did in the light of an important officer doing his duty to the Government and the State. He understood the hon. Member for Queen's County (Mr. A. O'Connor) to refer to Mr. Herbert Murray, who was an officer in the Treasury Department in Dublin. It was a matter of great regret to him (Mr. W. H. Smith), when he heard that it was the intention of the present Government to remove that gentleman from the position which he held in Dublin, and which he exercised with so much advantage to the public. It would be a very hard thing, indeed, if, because an officer had done his duty to the State in one position, he was not to be promoted to another—in other words, that Mr. Herbert Murray should be disqualified for any other position in the Public Service. Reference had been made to the fact that gentlemen who had filled positions in one office had been promoted to positions in another. He would only quote the case of the Permanent Secretary to the Treasury, who was advanced to his present position from that of Under Secretary in the Education Department. This was an instance of the advantage of being able to remove gentlemen from one Department and utilize their services in another. He could say from his own experience that it was very much to the advantage of the Public Service that it should be possible to move gentlemen in this way, and that there should be no exclusive right that promotion should follow from step to step in any one Department. If a contrary rule were laid down, the Public Service would, in his opinion, suffer exceedingly; and, therefore, he trusted that the House would give its sanction to the principle that the responsibility in these matters must lie with the Minister in whom the patronage rested. If that Minister made a mistake in the exercise of his patronage, the consequences of that mistake would fall upon himself. He ventured to say that, if mistakes were occasionally made, it was better, on the whole, that some should occur than that it should be the recognized right of any Department to have a monopoly of the highest posts in that Department. He abstained from expressing any opinion whatever upon the appointment which the Prime Minister had thought it right to make, 1747 because that was a matter which must remain for his discretion alone; but he might be permitted to express his regret that Mr. Herbert Murray should be removed from Dublin, because he was doing good work there; but, in as much as the responsibility in that matter rested with the Prime Minister, he considered that the present arrangement ought not to be disturbed.
§ MR. O'DONNELLsaid, when he saw right hon. Gentlemen rising to take part in the discussion of this subject, which naturally excited the sympathies both of the actual occupants of Office and those who expected to be in Office again, it occurred to him that it was time to give way. The present was a case in which it was likely that the old Parliamentary saying would be verified, that when the Front Benches did agree their unanimity was wonderful. They had before them an example of the great value which the Government attached to this very important class of patronage, and he was not surprised at that, because it was, undoubtedly, an important branch of the patronage of which they were the dispensers. He by no means wished to convey that he believed in the theory that, in every case in which they exercised their powers of patronage in this respect, they must necessarily be in the wrong; but he had been struck, as anyone must be, by the remarkable manner in which some members of the Civil Service, and sometimes those who were not members of it, found themselves in a position to have their merits closely scanned by the dispensers of patronage, and to have those merits recognized in a degree and manner in which other Civil Servants did not succeed. He referred to those Civil Servants who spent long and laborious lives in the ordinary work of administration, and who, however much they might deserve the confidence and praise of their immediate superiors, were overlooked, because they did not happen to be brought within the charmed circle which surrounded the high dispensers of patronage in the Service. He had listened with great interest to the speech of the noble Lord the Secretary to the Treasury (Lord Frederick Cavendish), which certainly rose to the level of the occasion. But, at the same time, he did not think the noble Lord could have believed that hon. Members, in raising this question, were bent on 1748 ascribing bad motives to anyone on account of the appointments referred to. It was not bad motives that hon. Members found fault with; but the little foibles and weaknesses of human nature, as displayed by the dispensers of the powers of patronage. The speech of the noble Lord consisted partly in prophecy, and partly in solemn declarations that the best men were always chosen for these appointments. With regard to the prophecy, he was not sufficiently acquainted with the future to be able to test the accuracy of the noble Lord's vaticinations; but with regard to the declaration that the best men were chosen, no doubt, men were selected who, it was believed, would justify the choice made, although, by a remarkable coincidence, these fortunate Private Secretaries to Prime Ministers and other high personages were not promoted to the positions in which, as the House was informed, they were so much required, until just before the departure from Office of the Prime Minister to whom they acted as Private Secretaries, and who, while their services as Secretaries were required, did not see the necessity of promoting them over the heads of others. It was only when irreconcilable constituencies removed the Prime Minister that he thought of the merit of his Private Secretary, and at once promoted him to a position of£1,500 or£2,000 a-year. He (Mr. O'Donnell) had no doubt that, as a rule, Private Secretaries who were promoted were men of capacity. It was not likely that they would be chosen as Private Secretaries without capacity; and, therefore, that question need not be raised. The question was that, in the ordinary service of the State in various Departments, there were men who, by length of service, were working their way to the top, and were close to the top—men of equal ability with these Private Secretaries—who had their chances of promotion stopped on a sudden by someone being brought into the office from the immediate vicinity of the dispensers of power of the day, who might be able men, but who had not served long and well in the Department in which they obtained such high promotion. The noble Lord the Secretary to the Treasury had challenged his hon. Friend (Mr. Arthur O'Connor), who brought this question before the House on the present occasion, to say anything, if he had any- 1749 thing to say, against the recent appointment of Mr. Young to the position of Deputy Chairman to the Board of Inland Revenue. There was nothing to be said against that appointment, but against the system of appointment, for, if the merit of service alone had been considered, Mr. Young ought to have received promotion a very long time before. A Paper had been placed in his (Mr. O'Donnell's) hands, written by someone who appeared to be acquainted with the facts, and it gave the history of the appointment of Mr. Young to the following1 effect:—It seemed that Mr. Young was one of the best Secretaries which the Inland Revenue Office had seen for a generation, notwithstanding that, when it was deemed advisable to promote Mr. Algernon West, the Premier of that day, who was also the Premier of the present day, did not hesitate to appoint him to the position of Commissioner in the Inland Revenue Department, over the head of Mr. Young. Again, when, after a while, the merits of Mr. Northcote appeared to the Chancellor of the Exchequer of another Administration to require marked appreciation, Mr. Northcote was appointed Commissioner to the Board of Inland Revenue, again over the head of Mr. Young. Then, when Mr. Charles Herries was obliged to retire from the Board on account of ill-health, it was found absolutely necessary to promote Mr. Young, over the head of one Commissioner who had been promoted over his head without any previous service. The conclusion was, therefore, that Mr. Young's promotion was delayed as long as possible; that Mr. Algernon West, Private Secretary, was brought into the Department over his head previously, as was also Mr. Northcote, doubtless a very capable gentleman, but who, he (Mr. O'Donnell) believed, had not possessed the advantage of being a member of the Civil Service at all, until he was bombarded into the position of Commissioner of the Inland Revenue. Under the circumstances, he could not but think that the noble Lord had put forward a somewhat unfortunate example of the present system of promotion in the case of Private Secretaries. The fact remained that a surprisingly large number of Secretaries, clerks in the Treasury, and gentlemen in the immediate vicinity of the chief dispensers of power and patronage, had 1750 obtained promotion over the heads of old, tried, and experienced members of Departments. The right hon. Gentleman the late First Lord of the Admiralty (Mr. W. H. Smith) left to the present Prime Minister the entire responsibility of the appointment of Mr. Herbert Murray to his present position, and regretted he should have been removed from Dublin, where he regarded him as the right man in the right place. That gentleman had been rather fortunate in his career of promotion. He had been promoted to the Assistant Postmaster-ship, and afterwards to the Secretaryship of the Customs Board, with the present salary of£1,400 a-year. He could assure the right hon. Gentleman the late First Lord of the Admiralty that, in the general opinion of the Service in Ireland, Mr. Herbert Murray was by no means that success, departmentally or socially, which the right hon. Gentleman seemed to imagine. Few interesting strangers from England ever earned less personal favour from the Staff of Irish officials than Mr. Herbert Murray, and it was not from Dublin that any wish would be expressed to have Mr. Murray back again. He (Mr. O'Donnell) understood that the only real justification for Mr. Murray's present appointment was that he was free from the traditions and free from the experience of the Customs Board; he had been specially selected for the purpose of pressing upon the Customs officials an entirely new view of Customs policy which the present Chancellor of the Exchequer thought it advisable to adopt. If Prime Ministers would promote their Private Secretaries, as a rule, at some date much earlier than their own approaching retirement, there would be much less ground for the suspicion that the promotions were made as a reward for faithful service as Private Secretaries to the Prime Minister, in which capacity they could be no longer retained. He could assure hon. Gentlemen sitting on both Front Benches that the dissatisfaction in the Service generally was extreme at the habitual interruption of promotion; at the habitual disregard of the merits of experienced officers; and at the habitual way in which private acquaintance, if not personal affection, seemed to interfere with the claims of the old and experienced servants of the; State. Both the Government and the 1751 Opposition Front Bench could depend upon the applause and the votes of the Parties which they were in the habit of leading, upon this, as upon every question; but the fact remained that there was a wide-spread dissatisfaction in the Public Departments at the manner in which all the best prizes of the Public Departments seemed to be reserved for gentlemen within the immediate cognizance of the occupants of the Treasury Bench. The occupants of the Treasury Bench might assure the House in perfect good faith that they always desired to choose the best men; but so long as they seemed to confine their appreciation of the best men to the men whom they happened to know best in their own immediate circle, so long would that dissatisfaction in the Public Service continue. If it was possible to appoint any constitutional test by which the opinions of the Civil Servants at large could be laid before the House, he was persuaded the result would be something startling. They who had the advantage of the explanations of the right hon. Gentleman, of course, did not for a moment entertain the idea that any unworthy favouritism had prompted the appointments under review; but amongst the mass of Civil Servants who had not the same opportunities of becoming convinced of the entire disinterestedness with which the occupants of the Treasury and Front Opposition Benches devoted themselves to the service of the State there was considerable doubt as to the impartiality of these appointments. He hoped that out of regard for the feelings of the public servants at large, every effort would be made in the future by the Treasury Bench to give, more frequently, chances of promotion to those servants of the State who seemed to have earned promotion, not in the immediate vicinity of Ministers, but by hard service, and by gradual rise in the State Departments. A few well-advertised instances of promotion as a result of long service and merit within a Department would go an immense way towards removing the impressions which a long series of, to outsiders, strange appointments had produced upon the Civil Service at large.
§ Motion, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," by leave, withdrawn.
§ Committee deferred till Monday next.