§ MR. FIELD (Dublin, St. Patrick)To ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether he will state who pays for the up-keep of the Colonial Audit Branch under the Controller and Auditor-General; how many of the officials in this branch are in receipt of pensions from Parliamentary funds, and whether these officials are in addition receiving full pay in their present positions.
(Answered by Mr. McKenna.) As the three Questions of which the hon. Member has given notice for 6th, 7tht and 14th March include matters which will be more conveniently answered together, I would ask him to allow me to reply to them at the same time. The Colonial Audit Branch does not stand on the same footing as ordinary departments of the Home Civil Service. All appointments to that branch, the bulk of the members of which serve abroad in various Colonies and Protectorates, are made by the Comptroller and Auditor-General, just as many similar Colonial appointments are made with the approval of the Secretary of State for the Colonies. The
†To ask the Secretary to the Treasury whether the Colonial Audit Branch, under the Controller and Auditor-General, is paid for out of Parliamentary funds; and, if not, how much is the amount of appropriations in aid received by the Exchequer and Audit Department for the housing, etc., of this Colonial Audit Branch; and why this amount is not clearly stated in the Estimates.272 higher officers at present in the branch at headquarters in London were selected from the staff of the Exchequer and Audit Department. Candidates for appointment must satisfy the Comptroller and Auditor-General that they possess the requisite knowledge and ability for the due discharge of their duties and that they are within the limits of age which are fixed at from eighteen to twenty-six. Their physical fitness for service in the Colonies, including the West Coast of Africa, is ascertained by one of the medical advisers of the Colonial Office. Some of the clerks were originally in the Second Division of the Civil Service, but the majority of the candidates recently appointed have been selected from graduates of the universities. In some cases appointments have been made from officials already in the Colonial service. The total number of the branch, including native clerks and messengers abroad, is at the present time 104. The entire charge, both effective and non-effective, of the branch is borne by the various Colonies and Protectorates, whose accounts are audited by that branch. No appropriations-in-aid are received by the Exchequer and Audit Department for the housing, etc., of the branch, who are accommodated in the same building with the main office of the Exchequer and Audit Department. The superintendent of the branch and one of the clerks, in addition to their pay from Colonial funds, are in receipt of pensions from Imperial funds as late clerks in the Exchequer and Audit Department. These officials, on the reorganisation of that department, were at the special request of the Comptroller and Auditor-General, allowed by the Treasury to retire on pension in order that they might take up appointments in the Colonial Audit Branch, thus giving the Colonies the benefit of their experience. They are in receipt of personal salaries from Colonial funds, fixed with regard to the fact of their being in receipt of Imperial pensions. The Comptroller and Auditor-General is alive to the fact that there are certain anomalies in the constitution of the department, and has under consideration a scheme with the object of removing them.