52. Mr. FRED HALLasked the Prime Minister in how many cases during the 1913 last five years private secretaries of Members of the Government have received permanent appointments in the Civil Service without open competition; the particulars of such cases; and whether he will consider the advisability of abolishing a practice which operates to the detriment of the officers in the Civil Service, who have obtained their position as the result of open examination at expense and trouble to themselves, and who by their training and experience have established a special claim to promotion?
§ The PRIME MINISTERParticulars of all appointments which were made from 5th December, 1905, to 28th February last without competitive examination to posts in the Civil Service will be given in the Return moved for by the right hon. Gentleman the Member for Bootle on the latter date. So far as I am aware, there are not more than four instances of private secretaries to Members of the Government, who were not previously Civil servants, being appointed to permanent posts in the Civil Service. These four are:—
It has been by no means the normal practice to appoint members of the Civil Service in the ordinary course to any of these posts. As the lion. Member is aware, a Commission to inquire into the method of making appointments to the Civil Service is now sitting, and I prefer to await the Commission's Report before expressing any opinion on the point raised in the last part of the question. I am, I need not say, anxious that Civil servants should not be kept out of the prizes of the Civil Service, but in the case of all these appointments the public interest is the governing consideration.
- Mr. Mark Sturgis, Special Commissioner of Income Tax.
- Mr. F. N. Rogers (who had ceased to be a private secretary), Small Holdings Commission.
- Mr. M. S. Green (who had previously been a Civil servant), Chairman of Irish Prisons Board.
- Mr. Lionel Earle, Secretary to the Office of Works.