50
To do this it will be necessary to price-cost the department,-this the Harbour Master should undertake under expert Treasury supervision,-and the Government should then fix the fees proportionately. Where work is done for foreign non-local firms the fees should be sufficiently high to ensure that the cost of the services rendered will be more than coveted.
13. It may be that the Yaumati Slipway constitutes an economy; the Commissioners considered the point at length, but in the absence of any comprehensible figures were unable to come to a conclusion. This sub-division of the Harbour Office should be price costed, and then a decision arrived at, as to whether (a) the slipway should not indeed be enlarged to take all Government launches, and to undertake machine repairs, or alter- natively, (b), be closed entirely except for such accommodation as is needed for stores. It cannot be economic to play at repair work. Either all Government launches should be wholly repaired at the slipway or no repairs be undertaken at all.
14. A matter which came to the notice of the Commissioners is the payment of overtime in connection with surveys of ships and emigration work. They would point out that the system is one very liable to abuse. Supervision should be exercised to keep it down to the minimum.
15. Summarised the reductions amount to eight Europeans out of a total of thirty- three, or about 24%. This does not include the reduction in the Senior Clerical and Accounting Staff, which would bring the figure up to 31%. The reductions in the Asiatic Staff are confined to the clerks, this being the only branch in which there has been any increase.
18. The Harbour Department is a revenue producing one. As already indicated all its separate sub-departments, Marine Surveyors, Junk Inspectors, the Slipway, etc., should be separately price-costed so as to show the true relation between receipts and expenditure, in order that it can be seen from direct and reliable records exactly how money is received and expended.
LICENCE FEES.
BOATS AND JUNKS.
1921-1929.
Boats.
Junks.
Total
No. of Junk Inspectors.
1921
$102,427
$46,910
$149,337
4
1922
106,539
52,910
159,449
4
1923
111,600
55,681
167,284
5
1924
118,176
57,999
176,175
5
1925
119,153
51,458
170,611
5
1926
115,406
52,103
167,509
6
1927
116,380
.52,390
169,770
7
1928
115,498
49,951
165,452
7
1929
116,604
49,729
166,333
7
ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE.
Numerically the smallest of the Government Departments, consisting as it does of the Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General and the Stenographer. The time of the Attorney General is fully occupied with the drafting of legislation, and the answering of the multifarious legal conundrums that come to him as principal law officer of the Government. The work of Director of Public Prosecutions falls largely to the lot of the Assistant Not only does he usually appear for the Crown in criminal cases at the Sessions and in important preliminary hearings before the Magistrates, but he daily devotes some hours to acting as legal adviser to the Police Department. No reductions are therefore recommended.
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.