TNAG-0812-FCO40-1017-Allegations-of-bribery-and-corruption-in-Hong-Kong-1978 — Page 76

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What is Supervisory Accountability

All Government officers who have a responsibility to direct and control staff, be it one or more junior officers, embrace a two-fold responsibility - for the satisfactory discharge of their own specific duties (whether professional, technical or managerial) and the discharge of their duties as supervisors. This latter responsibility extends and increases as an officer climbs upwards through the many levels of Government. At the top, a heavy burden rests upon Heads of Departments and Secretaries of the Government Secretariat. Ultimate responsibility lies with H.E. the Governor as formalised in the "Letters Fatent and Royal Instructions to the Governor of Hong Kong",

As a supervisor, an officer can be held accountable at any time for the proper leadership, control and supervision of his junior officers.

is suggested, at the very least, that he should also be held accountable for those malpractices by his junior officers which are so repeated or widespread that they should have come to his attention if he had been conscientious. The views expressed to us in the course of this study can be summed up in the following definition :

"Supervisory accountability does not mean that an officer is

automatically and personally responsible for every instance of misconduct or inefficiency by those subordinate officers for whom he is responsible. That standard would be unrealistic and unfair. However, an officer should be asked to account for such acts or omissions, if they are so serious, repeated or widespread that by reasonable diligence he should have known of them had he exercised a level of leadership, management and supervision commensurate with his position."

Application of supervisory accountability is based upon the onus placed on an officer to answer for the way in which he had discharged his responsibility as a supervisor. His Head of Department or his senior officers must judge whether to accept or reject the answer given. If it is rejected the next step is to determine whether he has failed in his duty as a supervisor. These are conclusions which must be arrived at by common sense and reasonableness, having considered all the factors, including those put forward in mitigation by the officer called to

account.

At this point it is necessary to sound a note of warning because it is possible to confuse "supervisory accountability" with criminal liability for the corrupt acts of one's junior officers. Supervisory accountability derives from the exercise of management and leadership and has, as its basis, the contractual responsibility on the part of every supervisory employee to be effective in the discharge of his supervisory function. Therefore, where there has been wide- spread or repeated corrupt activity on the part of junior officers, the supervisory officer is only guilty if he is a party to the corrupt activity of his junior officers. However, this supervisory officer, if he fails to detect and to act upon widespread and repeated mis- conduct on the part of his staff, is clearly in breach of his contractual responsibility to exercise a level of leadership, management and supervision commensurate with his position.

Based on

Memorandum from Fatrick V. Murphy, Police Commissioner, Police Dept., City of New York - September 20th, 1971.

and Memorandum from Donald F. Cawley, Police Commissioner, Police Dept.,

City of New York - May 23rd, 1973.

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