General.
d
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CHAPTER IV.
ALLOWANCES.
44.
After careful consideration of the allowances
at present payable in the public scrvice, we are of the opinion that the majority of them can be dispensed with, provided that the permanent emoluments of posts are otherwise adecuate for their holders. A major exception is the high cost of living allowance, the temporary retention of which in a modified form appears to us to be essential unvil stable conditions return. Apart from the high cost of living allowance which is dealt with fully in Chapter X, we recommend that in general, allowances shoul only be prescribed in rcspcc of:-
reimbursable expenditure incurred in performance of duty;
(i)
(ii)
duties extraneous to normal duties;
(iii)
special risks.
Quarters and Allowances in lieu of uarters.
45.
We have already stated in paragraph 31 that we recommend the abolition of the privilege which certain officers at present enjoy in occupying Government quarters free of charge. We also recommend the abolition of rent allowances and have inster in accordance with the principle cnunciated in the Colonial Office White Paper incorporated an appropriate clenient for rent into eli revise basic salarics. ve consider that the present system of rent allowances and charges for the use of Government quarters is unnecessarily complicated, is open to criticism as being discriminatory and is the cause of many anomalies. It was not until 1946 that any change was made in the maximum permissible rentals laid down in General Order 109 as the result of the 1928 Salaries Cormission's recomendations, although it is obvious that there were considerable fluctuations
Even with the in rents during the intervening period. recent increase of 30% introduced to bring rent allowances into line with controlled rents under the Landlord and Tenant Ordinance, 1947, the evidence produced to us shows that in many instances the rents paid by officers on doller salaries for accommodation of a type greatly inferior to that which they occupied before the war bears little relation to th. rent allowances they are at present receiving. connexion we have taken no acccunt of rents in excess of the controlled rates, although there is ample evidence that many Government servants are being forced
We have by principal tenants to pay cxcessive rents. already forwarded a separate recommendation to Government that steps should be taken to advise the public of their rights as tenants under the Landlord and Tonent Ordinance and to give Government servants and other members of the public such assistance as is possible to secure those rights.
In this
46.
We consider that the practice of treating house allowance as part of pensionable emoluments is an
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