PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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C.O.885
21 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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8. In dealing with the more important criticisms and suggestions which have been made on the draft Ordinance and Regulations we have not thought it necessary to refer specifically to purely verbal amendments. Alterations in the draft consequent on the suggestions made are shown in red ink in the annexed copy.*
9. Heading of draft A.
Ordinance.
The words "South African Protectorates " have been deleted.
10. Clause 1. The date in this clause is now left blank. It is very important, however, that the same date should be inserted in all Colonies which adopt our proposals.
11. Clause 2. The Eastern Department have drawn attention, in connexion with the definition of "pensionable emoluments," to the fact that house allowance is not normally pensionable in certain of the Eastern Colonies, and that special reasons exist for continuing its exclusion. This could be effected by adding, in Eastern legislation, after (3) house allowance" the words "if declared pensionable in the case of a particular office by a notification published in the Government Gazette."
12. Clauses 7 and 9. The East African Department are doubtful as to the proposed provision for the retirement of European Officers serving in East Africa after eighteen years' service, and the Niger Department are inclined to disagree with the proposed ages of compulsory and voluntary retirement. These are not points in which general uniformity is essential, and we regard them as matters for departmental decision. It is, however, desirable to have the same rule as regards age in all the West African Colonies and Protectorates.
13. Clause 10 (1). We considered the suggestion (Mr. A. J. Harding) that an addition should be made after "duty" to make the wording correspond with Regula tion 12. It appeared to us, however, that the proposed addition would make the clause cumbrous, and that the clause as drafted already sufficiently indicated the class of case to which it referred.
14. Clause 10 (2). The view (Mr. Darnley) that the proposed limitation of pensions to a maximum of £1,000 a year was arbitrary and illogical is not generally accepted and we adhere to our recommendation. Governors' pensions are limited by Act of Parliament to £1,300 a year, and the limitation to £1,000 a year in the case of other Colonial officials is already in force in certain of the Eastern Colonies.
15, Clause 11. We have modified the wording of this clause to meet criticisms of the phrase "salary and fees of such office." We considered the suggestion (Mr. Flood) that re-employment in a non-pensionable appointinent should not necessarily involve abatement of pension and that the clause should be arnended so as to give the Secretary of State a dispensing power in such cases; but to provide a dispensing power in the Ordinance would doubtless encourage many officers to ask that it should be applied to their cases, and, moreover, experience suggested that a dispensing power was hardly necessary.
Owing to the definition of " other public service" the clause does not apply in the case of re-employment in a military or naval capacity. Cases where its application is undesirable in the case of re-employment in a non-pensionable civil capacity we believe to be rare. When they do occur it will no doubt be possible to deal specially with them. Moreover, the cases to which Mr. Flood refers are cases under the old two-thirds rule which admittedly involved hardship.
16. As regards the question of taking into consideration, when calculating abatement of pension, any duty allowance drawn by the officer at the time of his first retirement (Mr. Green), we felt that such a provision would lead to more anomalies than it would avoid, and that it was better to adhere to the simple standard of pensionable emoluments. 17. Clauses 13 and 14. In accordance with a suggestion of the West Indian Department, we have added words which will give power, in cases of bankruptcy and conviction, to pay part or the whole of the pension to dependents other than wives and children.
18. We see no objection to the suggestion (Mr. Grindle) that in the West Indies the power conferred by clause 13 should be vested in the Governor in Council rather than in the Secretary of State.
19. Clause 15. The essential parts of this clause have been adopted from the draft approved by Mr. Harcourt for general enactment in the Colonies. The csuggestion
(Mr. Flood) for a time limit was at the time carefully considered and rejected. The further question (Mr. Flood) of penalising pensioners who became company promoters or set up in the Colony businesses other than companies may be worthy of adoption, but as the lines of the clause have been recently settled after careful consideration, we du not feel called upon to offer any observations on it.
• Shown here in square brackets (insertions) and obliterated type.
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Regulations, Part I.
20. Regulation 3. The suggestion (Mr. Flood) that the words "whether with or without salary" should be added at the end of the Regulation, is, in our opinion, unnecessary. Regulation 3 deals solely with service which qualifies an officer for pension as opposed to gratuity or vice versa, whereas Regulation 5, to which Mr. Flood refers as likely to cause disputes, deals with an entirely separate matter, viz., what service should be taken into account in the computation of a pension.
21. Regulation 5. There have been two expressions of opinion (Mr. Green and Mr. A. J. Harding) contrary to our recommendation that, subject to a maximum limit, leave with half salary should be allowed to count in full for pension purposes. On the other hand, Mr. Fiddian and Mr. Flood express definite opinions in favour of our recom- mendation, and none of the other Departments differ from our proposal. We see no reason to modify the views expressed in paragraph 34 of our Report.
22. Regulation 6. It has recently been decided, in the case of Captain Elgee, of Nigeria, that service on the Active List of the Army or Navy shall count in full for pension, except in cases where pension contributions have been paid by the Colonial Government and have not been refunded. We have modified the draft Regulations so that it accords with this decision.
23. Regulation 7. The Eastern Department have pointed out that this Regulation, as originally drafted, made no special provision for officers appointed to a class, and not a particular post; so that the approval of the Secretary of State would be necessary for the grant of a pension calculated on final pensionable emoluments to an officer who, within the last three years of his service, had been transferred from one post to another in the
sume class.
We have accordingly redrafted the Regulation to provide ordinarily for cases where, as a result of a transfer, computation of pension on average pensionable emoluments would place the officer in a worse position than if the transfer had not taken place, except those where the transfer has carried with it a change of pensionable emoluments. It was not desirable to use the word "Class" in the regulation, as that term has no fixed meaning the Colonies generally: We are of opinion that cases of degradation make it necessary that the approval of the Secretary of State should be required in cases where there has been a change of pensionable emoluments consequent on a transfer,
4. Regulation 8. Mr. A. J. Harding and Mr. Flood raise the question whether the word "immediately" should appear before "preceded" in this Regulation. We omitted the word advisedly (though by inadvertence it appeared in our* Report and in the corresponding Regulation in Part II) since the conditions under which breaks of service may be ignored or defined by Regulation 4.
25. Our recommendation in favour of the abolition of the rule in force in some Colonies by which service paid out of an
open vote " is treated on a different basis from other non-pensionable service in that it cannot in any circumstances count more than two-thirds for pension is accepted with only one dissentient voice (Mr. A. J. Harding).
This two-thirds rule appears to us to work in a manner that is largely fortuitous and to introduce unnecessary complications, and we see no reason to modify our recommendation that all non-pensionable service should be placed on the same basis, and that the question as to how much, if any,
of should count for pension should be reserved for the decision of the Secretary of State.
an officer's non-pensionable service As an instance of the disadvantages of the two-thirds rule we understand that, in West Africa, the salaries paid to officers engaged for temporary construction work are now generally the same as those paid to officers engaged for the regular establishment, and that the temporary agreements on which both classes of officers are engaged contain substantially the same provisions. It also appears that the Crown Agents for the Colonies, when engaging officers for railway and public works appointments, recruit the same type of man for both classes of appointments and do not find that the demand for one class of appointment is greater than that for the other.
Moreover, officers serving on open lines agreements are frequently lent for con- struction work and vice versa, and under the present pension law the position of certain classes of officers (e.g., of an officer who, while serving on a construction agreement, has been doing the work of an officer on the regular establishment and has been paid from money provided on the Estimates) is not a little obscure.
The recommendation (Mr. Harding's) that no non-pensionable employment should in any circumstances be allowed to count for pension is a reversal of the existing practice
• Now corrected an omitted in final print. C. A. H., 16th Sept., 1915.