208
A
the amount of them. The maximum salary of each class is separated from the minimum salary of the class above it by the amount of one educational increment. The system offers to a young man with the necessary qualifications who joins either of the lowest classes the chance of fairly regular promotion throughout his career. Of course there will be many cases of a clerk when he has reached the maximum salary of his grade not being considered suitable for promotion
and to a higher one being passed over by others of better qualifica- tions when vacancies occur in the higher grade. This may tend to the disappointed man leaving the service but it will be better to occasionally lose those men who have proved themselves unsuited for promotion than to have constantly to accept the resignations of the best of the junior clerks as has been the case in the Post Office in the past. In this connection I would refer you to the first enclosure of the Despatch of the 20th. June, 1904.
7.
The application to the Post Office of the scheme of grading embodied in the foregoing paragraph would in- voive on the whole less departure from the system of classifica- tion hitherto in force than the scheme proposed in Mr. May's Despatch with regard to the introduction of which I was authoris- ed by your telegram of the 27th, July, 1904, to use my discretion.
I have discussed with the Postmaster-General how the new system can be best applied to his Department and 1 annex a scheme which has been carefully worked out by him and appears to me satis- factory for its gradual introduction in a manner which, while framed with due regard to economy, is fair to the clerks already in the Office and will be encouraging to others to join the Department. It involves an addition to the Estimates for 1906 of $1,621 for Hongkong and $961 for Shanghai, or a total of $2,562, on account of increased salaries. On the assumption, scarcely likely to be realized, that there are no changes of Staff in 1906 it will involve a further addition of $4,227 in the Estimates
25970/04
Enclosure.!...
for