ADMINISTRATION IN CONFIDENCE
45.
Miss Ellis is PA to the Head of Department and does all of his shorthand and typing together with the usual duties of a PA. She also handles the special material. Miss Harrup and Miss Oxley look after the needs of the Assistant and five Desk Officers.
46.
HKGD have three secretarial posts on their establishment but until last month only two were occupied. The Department has a mutual arrangement with FED to assist when pressure is high, but it has fallen into disuse.
47.
Typing output during the month preceding the inspection, judged against CSD norms, amounted to more work than is expected of two secretaries but not enough fully to occupy three. I was told that this had been a particularly busy period and unrepresentative of the previous year and that in normal times the Department generally produced work enough for only two with recourse to the pool where necessary. Several Desk Officers commented, however, that last year there were delays. The trend of the work this year has been upwards and I am reluctant to cut a post if this is maintained. Probably the best arrangement would be a pooling of work with FED and the sharing of one post. Providing this meets FED's needs and accommodation convenient to both departments can be found, preferably housing the three secretaries together, I recommend that half a secretarial post be cut.
48.
During the period under review 80% of Miss Harrup's work and 70% of Miss Oxley's was copytyping. Perhaps with only two secretaries serving the Department until recently Desk Officers have acquired the habit of working in longhand. I recommend that Desk Officers make greater efforts to acquire the essential skills of dictation. Even so, I believe that the Department's needs would be best met if the third secretary, shared with FED, were a copy typist, $5. I so recommend.
Registry
со
DS10
Miss A J Warburton > Mr P G Devine
>
Hong Kong Section
CO
Miss C M Rowan
General Section
49. HKGD, having absorbed General Section in 1977, gave up two registry posts as well as a half share in a DS9 Head of Registry. Three integrated Clerks, two in the Hong Kong Section, one in the General Section, cover the ground.
50. The Registry Examiner, Mr Owen, who inspected registry procedures, was very satisfied with the standard of registry work (see Annex A). With minor exceptions procedures are being followed carefully. Mr Owen made the helpful recommendation, which I endorse and which the Department welcome, that amendments to the 24 volumes of Hong Kong Law should not be made both in the Department and in the Legal Library in Downing Street East, but only in the latter. He has recommended, too, that a review of staffing be made in six months' time when it may be possible to give up one post. I am content with
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ADMINISTRATION IN CONFIDENCE
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