HC Deb 30 March 1943 vol 388 cc140-8

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."—[Major Sir James Edmondson.]

Mr. William Brown (Rugby)

I am afraid the matter I want to raise cannot compete in interest with the subject of India, but I think it is not without its importance. I wish to discuss an appointment to the Civil Service, made by the Board of Trade, which, in my submission, contains all the elements of jobbery of the worst type, and ought, in the public interest, to be undone.

On 31st August last the Factory Premises Controller of the Board of Trade, North Midland District, with offices at Nottingham, urged on the Board of Trade the necessity for creating a new post of assistant controller in that office. One month later on 29th September, the Board of Trade approved the creation of that post. A fortnight later, a Mr. Wigley was appointed to the post at a salary of £450 a year. I wish to comment on the following points: (1) the circumstances in which Mr. Wigley was appointed, (2) his qualifications for the job, (3) one or two other circumstances that may throw light on the appointment, and (4) the significance from a Civil Service and public point of view of this appointment.

Before I deal with those points I want to remind the House that, in times of peace, appointments to the public service are made on the basis of merit as determined by success in open competitive examination. In time of war, for good reasons or bad, open competition is suspended, and a new method has to be found for making appointments in the public service. In this war we have devised two new methods. In relation to ordinary humble, repetitive, routine jobs, such as clerical jobs, shorthand typing and so on, we have, by agreement between the Treasury and the unions, utilised the machinery of the employment exchanges. For more important posts of higher quality, involving executive capacity, and specialist and technical knowledge, we have instituted the Central Register compiled by the Minister of Labour. It will be remembered that the folk of this country who felt that they had qualifications for serving the State in this way were invited to send in their names to the Central Register. There are, I believe, at the moment something like 70,000 to 90,000 names on that Register, which are supposed to be classified under different heads, so that, whenever a Government Department wanted a person of particular qualifications, it could go to the Register and select, from the appropriate subhead, a number of names of men and women who would be suitable.

I now turn to the question of how Mr. Wigley was appointed. On 2nd October last year the existence of this vacancy was notified to the Ministry of Labour Appointments Department in London. At that time Mr. Wigley was unknown to the Appointments Department, and his name did not figure on the Central Register. So far as the Ministry of Labour was concerned, Mr. Wigley was non-existent. On 7th October, five days after the appointment had been notified, Mr. Wigley suddenly registered at the Appointments Department of the Ministry of Labour in Nottingham. Still more remarkable, within 24 hours of his being registered his name was submitted by the Ministry of Labour Appointments Department in Nottingham, to the Board of Trade, for appointment to this vacancy. Five days later, on 12th October, Mr. Wigley was appointed. It must be plain to every Member, first, that there could have been no serious consideration given to the question whether there was on the Register, at the time when this vacancy was created, somebody who possessed the necessary qualifications; second, that no consideration could have been given to the question of whether the Board of Trade, with its staff of many thousands, possessed an officer who had some claim to promotion to a higher post; third, that no consideration could have been given to the question whether this job of £450 a year could not have been given to one of the many ex-officers from the Army, who were advertising their need of jobs in the Press of Nottingham at that time.

Sir Joseph Nall (Manchester, Hulme)

Or whether the job was necessary?

Mr. Brown

I will come later to that and will give reasons to question whether it was necessary. Assuming that it was, I am submitting that what I have said proves that the Board of Trade could have given no consideration to the three properly constituted sources of recruitment, and that Mr. Wigley was jobbed into this job. I come now to the Board of Trade's excuse for this highly favourable treatment of Mr. Wigley. My. hon. Friend the Member for South Croydon (Sir H. Williams) asked on 2nd February: Is it not rather strange that this gentleman did not register until five days after the Board was asked to find somebody? The President of the Board of Trade replied: Not in my judgment…In my judgment it was a sensible, quick decision, taken in time of war which any practical business man would take in time of war or peace."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 2nd February, 1943; col. 732, Vol. 586.] It will be noticed that there is nothing half-hearted about "our Hugh." Speed was the justification for this appointment. But the very same Minister who put forward this need as his justification told us that although this post was recommended to be created on 31st August, it was not approved until 29th September. In other words, so little was the urgency then apparent, that the Board of Trade could take a whole month in leisurely Yogi contemplation as to whether the creation of this job was really necessary. After a month of contemplation, it becomes a matter of downright urgency that we should disregard every source of recognised government recruitment and job Mr. Wigley into the job in 14 days.

Now I want to look at Mr. Wigley's qualifications for this job. The House was told on 23rd February, when I put a Question to the President of the Board of Trade: According to the particulars supplied to my Department by the Ministry of Labour, Mr. Wigley was employed for four years in a firm of chartered accountants, then acted for seven years as a traveller in yams "— That I am prepared to believe— for a Nottingham firm, and subsequently for four years was a partner in a Leicester firm dealing in yarns."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd February, 1943; cols. 1 and 2, Vol. 387.] It is a constant source of complaint of mine that there is a certain difference of emphasis between one Front Bencher and another. On 11th March, when I addressed a Question on this subject to the Minister of Labour, he gave me a slightly different reply. He said: He was registered under the National Service Acts as a yam-merchant on his own account for the previous 12 years."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 11th March, 1943; col. 835, Vol. 387.] Now, the functions of the job to which Mr. Wigley has been appointed are to go round finding suitable factory and storage accommodation. Plainly, if Mr. Wigley had been employed by a firm of chartered accountants, that would have no bearing upon his capacity to assess factory or storage accommodation. But what about his being a traveller in yarns, or, as the Minister of Labour put it, a yarn merchant? Well, I have sources of information which are not open to every Member of Parliament. There are members of my association, the Civil Service Clerical Association, inside every Government Department in Britain. [An HON. MEMBER: "A Gestapo."] I would not describe this as a Gestapo but as an instrument of home security. At any rate, I have sources of information, and I checked up upon the alleged qualifications of Mr. Wigley, and I got from a civil servant in Nottingham, of great repute and of known responsibility, this report, which I think the House should hear: This gentleman is about 35 and his circum-stances are well known to people in Leicester and Nottingham. Only a few years ago he was ostensibly employed in the firm of Messrs. Wigley & Sons Ltd. in which his father had family interests. It is well known that he did no real work and occupied himself by occasional visits from Nottingham to a small branch in Leicester. At no time has he ever been a yarn merchant. Prior to the outbreak of war his father ceased to be concerned with the firm and retired. It was made a condition of the purchase of the father's interest that the son above-named should at once get out. From then he has done no work whatever, nor is he regarded as capable of doing any. A former employee of the firm took an office in Leicester and carried on business for a time in London and received on occasions visits from the above-named Wigley under the name of Collard & Wigley, yam agents"— not merchants, notice this. At the outbreak of war this ceased so far as he was concerned. He spent a short time in the police force, but when he knew that he had been graded in a low medical grade he resigned, and did not offer himself for, nor was he directed to, any form of National Service. It is quite inaccurate to say that he has been a yarn merchant on his own account for 12 years, or at all, and no attempt was made to put him into any other work anywhere. He just loafed around, and is known to be of little use other than as a motor-car driver. Those are the qualifications of the person the Board of Trade was in such a hurry to appoint to this post. I now want to cast a little light upon another circumstance which may explain why this man was appointed. [Interruption.]

Dr. Russell Thomas (Southampton)

As a junior Member of this House, may I ask for your guidance, Mr. Deputy-Speaker? I have listened to this Debate with an increasing feeling that the dignity of our proceedings seems to be somewhat lowered by the fact that the hon. Member addressing us has twice referred to Members by their Christian names—once to a Minister and then to the hon. Member for Moseley (Sir P. Hannon)—and now he carries on a cross-conversation with other hon. Members. It seems that the tone of this Debate is on a level derogatory to the dignity for which this House has always been famed.

Mr. Brown

I am certain that those hon. Members, and the Minister, to whom I have inadvertently referred by their Christian names, will regard that as a signal honour. I was coming to a curious circumstance which may explain quite a lot. It is that the address of Mr. Wigley is 19, Private Road, Nottingham. That address emerges also as the address of the Factory Premises Controller, that is to say, of the man who recommended Mr. Wigley for his appointment, and has since reported on his work. The same address! It emerges further that the flat let to the man who recommended Mr. Wigley is let by Mrs. Wigley, the mother of Mr. Wigley. It may be conceivable that this "private road" address may explain the extraordinarily private road by which Mr. Wigley has been afforded entry into His Majesty's Civil Service.

It is disastrous that the general public should begin to learn that jobs in His Majesty's service may be arranged in this way. It is unfair also that serving civil servants in Britain should come to believe that outside or inside influence is more important to advancement than the way a man does his job. Thirdly, this case is an injustice to every one of the 90,000 men and women who have put their names down in good faith on the Central Register, believing that they would be called if they had anything to offer. The fourth point is that the freedom of the public service in Britain from nepotism and patronage is a thing that this House, if it is wise, will insist upon at any price, now and at all times. I know—and I am going to be a little pointed—that since I raised this case in the House of Commons the Board of Trade have issued a new Order, which is perhaps the best justification for my raising the question, taking away the freedom of local people to make this kind of appointment. I have a copy of this Order in my files, gathered by my "Gestapo." I shall not quote it, but I have it here available to any Mem- ber of the House. It is, however, not good enough that after the horse has been stolen, the Board of Trade should shut the stable gates. It is necessary that this wrong appointment should be cancelled, that this post should be declared vacant, and that we should have an honest, straightforward and true assessment of the claims of different people for appointment to this post on merit, and not on patronage and nepotism.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Captain Waterhouse)

I am afraid that I have not very long to reply to the extremely full case that my hon. Friend has put. He never is an advocate of understatement. On this particular issue his opening words were that it was a piece of jobbery of the worst order. I believe I can show to the House that that is completely and absolutely unfounded. I have no exception to take at all to the factual statement of my hon. Friend. From this I definitely exclude the long extract from some anonymous correspondent about Mr. Wigley. The circumstances are these: I think the House will realise that they are not in any way extraordinary. We have set up this organisation for finding factory and storage equipment. We have set it up on a regional basis. It would be obviously impossible for the Board of Trade to try and run such an organisation from Whitehall, and I do not think the House would desire that for one moment. In order to get that administration running, we have appointed a number of Regional Controllers, and in those Regional Controllers we have complete confidence. When they lose our confidence we will ask them to find another post. Until we lose confidence in them we are prepared to support them.

In this particular area of Nottingham there have been certain troubles about the Regional Factory and Storage Control. Mr. Walters had done extremely well for us in Wales. We asked him to go to Nottingham to reorganise there. He went there early last year—in March, I think—and in the following six months he did extremely good work and was able to pull the whole organisation together. Then came the time when he wanted an assistant, and late in August he asked us whether we would give permission for him to appoint an assistant. My hon. Friend complains that we took some time to consider whether that appointment should be made. I think we were abso- lutely right in considering for three or four weeks whether or not £450 a year of the taxpayers' money should be spent. When we decided that point Mr. Walters was quite right in getting on with the job and finding a man as soon as he could. It is absolutely misleading the House to suggest that on the Central Register there are 80,000 or 90,000 people capable and waiting for jobs. It is not so, and the hon. Member knows it. Most of these people are in jobs, and it is not now easy to find men for jobs. Mr. Wigley was known to Mr. Walters. There is no jobbery about the thing at all. Walters had taken a flat in Mrs. Wigley's house, but that does not mean that he was going to find Mr. Wigley a job. If he had not liked the flat, he would have got another instead. That insinuation, to my mind, is absolutely unworthy of the hon. Member. Mr. Walters met Mr. Wigley, whom he did not know very well, but he knew he had some knowledge of the trade in Nottingham and some knowledge of the district, and that he would do the job reasonably well for him.

Mr. Wigley was appointed on probation. After a month the usual report came through. After two months a further report came—[Interruption.] Yes, sent by the man who appointed him. [Laughter.] Hon. Members may laugh, but who would be likely to send a report except the man responsible to the Board of Trade. If hon. Members want someone else to send it, will they suggest who should do so? We have appointed Mr. Walters to carry out this job. He has appointed his assistant. The job is going very well, and I do not see why hon. Members should cavil at the fact that this appointment has been made. If Mr. Wigley fails to carry out the duties, he will be relieved of his post. Until then we are prepared to stand by him, because we are satisfied that Mr. Walters, in the execution of his proper discretion, knowing the urgency of filling the post, knowing the difficulty to-day of finding a suitable man for this post—because my hon. Friend is rather apt to gloss that over——

Mr. Brown

I could find the hon. and gallant Gentleman 20,000 people in the Service to fill that job.

Captain Waterhouse

If the hon. Member will do that, it will be most valuable. If he will make out his list of 20,000 people, I shall be glad to pass it on and see if we cannot use it another time. Mr. Wigley was appointed with what seemed to Mr. Walters adequate qualifications. He has been in the job for five months, and nothing he has done has led Mr. Walters, whom I have seen myself and discussed the matter with, to modify his view that the appointment was a reasonable one. That Mr. Wigley is the beginning and end of all efficiency no one pretends, but one does not expect that for £450 a year. But he is doing his job, and has done it, and when he ceases to do his job well the House may be assured that the Board of Trade will terminate his appointment.

Sir Herbert Williams (Croydon, South)

Has there been any independent report on Mr. Wigley except that of the man who has appointed him?

Captain Waterhouse

I have said not. How can one have a report except from the man who is in charge? One must trust the man whom one puts in charge.

It being the hour appointed for the Adjournment of the House, Mr. DEPUTY-SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.