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some officers over the age of 40. I understand that it was a number of cases of this sort within the knowledge of the members of the Commission which induced them to make the recommendation contained in paragraph 163 of their report. It may be that the increased pressure and pace of Government work in the post-war period and the multiplicity and variety of new problems now confronting colonial administrations have served to emphasise the disabilities liable to affect some public officers over the age of 40 to which Mr. Ormsby Gore referred in 1936.
5. During the recent Budget debate in Legislative Council all Unofficial Members referred directly or indirectly to the desirability of Government ridding itself of "dead wood" and there is no doubt that the Salaries Commission's references to pruzing Government staffs reflect a view widely held by many sections of the public in Hong Kong. If pruning is to be seriously attempted it cannot be effective for many years to come unless new powers are available to compel officers to retire earlier than is at present possible.
6.
My own view, which is shared by my advisers, is that the public service would benefit to a considerable degree if powers existed to compel retirement at 45. Confirmation to the permanent establishment must, for a number of reasons, be considered very early in an officer's career, usually while he is still under 30. Thereafter he will normally serve for a cuarter of a century during which period, in the absence of some spectacular lapse, it is for all practical purposes impossible to terminate his services. It seems
obvious and right that at a reasonable point between confirmation and ultimate retirement at the age limit Jovernment should have an opportunity of considering the advisability of terminating the service of an officer who, it may be through no fault of his own, has become incapable of discharging his responsibilities with sufficient vigour: more especially since the public service invariably takes its tone from the senior officers throughout the various grades.
7. It is evident that the efficiency of the administration would gain were it possible for it to rid itself of ofiicers who at the age of 45 were worked out, or had lost (or never fullygained) confidence in themselves, or who suffered from a sense of disappoint- ment, disgruntlement or defeat, or were otherwise incapacitated from the resolute and energetic performance of their duties by a deficiency of character developed in their middle years which could not have been forecast at the time of their confirmation to the permanent establishment.
8. With cost an insignificant factor, the one possible drawback that I can see to the proposal lies in the fact that it would be essential, if justice were to be done, to match the Government's right to call on an officer to retire at 45 with a corresponding right on the part of the officer to claim retirement at the same age if he so desired. I have every reason to believe that the civil service would deeply resent an arrangement which could not be invoked at the mutual discretion of either party: and indeed it would be difficult to justify any other arrangement. It is therefore necessary to attempt to estimate whether discretion to retire at 45 would drain off from the public service an appreciable number of efficient officers at the period of their maximum value to Government thus embarrassing administration or materially impairing its effectiveness.
9. After careful consideration I do not feel that Government need be prevented from adopting the recommendation in paragraph 163 of the Salaries Commission keport by the fear that an undue number