CO129-569-8 Reorganisation of Administrative Service 4-4-1938 - 17-11-1938 — Page 8

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obviously based on the assumption that the posts

in question are normally open only to

Administrative Cadets serving in Hong Kong. The

public convenience is best served by appointing to

a vacant post the most suitable officer available

he may be the senior of the Hong Kong Cadets or he

may not: he may even be serving outside Hong Kong.

It might be argued that even under the agreed grade

system, the public interest is not properly served

if the senior Cadet, assuming that he is generally

efficient, must on the occurrence of a vacancy in

the senior grade be moved up, even though he is not

fitted for the particular post which is vacant. If

there has to be a shuffle round every time a

vacancy occurs, the Government may easily be accused

of subordinating the public interest to that of its

I do not know the case of Mr.Sayer, but

officers.

from what Mr.Rogers says, consideration of his

status seems to have successfully outweighed that of

the public interest.

It is essential that the Secretary

of State should have a free hand in dealing with

is home

vacancies about the administrative time-scale, and

this can be assured only by treating the posts above the time-scale as separate and distinct appointments,

open not only to officers of the Hong Kong Civil

Service, but also to officers serving elsewhere.

it happens that the most suitable officer to fill a

If

technical

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❤

technical vacancy is not in the Colonial

Administrative Service and the post comes

into its appropriate Unified Service, there

would be no objection to increasing the

number of purely administrative super-scale

posts in Hong Kong, so as to restore the

balance of prospects for the Administrative

Officers, (see Mr.Cowell's minute of 4/11/37

on the 1937 file). In deciding the suitability

of an officer for the vacancy, consideration

would naturally be given to the special

knowledge of Hong Kong conditions which the

Administrative Officers serving there have,

and I think that that principle, properly

applied should meet Mr.Gent's objections to

the new system.

?

The reply should ask the

Governor to reconsider the question on this

basis.

1365

13th May, 1938.

Page

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