3. PUBLIC RELATIONS ROLE OF SENIOR GOVERNMENT OFFICERS.
If Government has to take the initiative as stated in para 2(b), then
it is most important that senior officers are briefed and at ease in
performing
these public relations functions and therefore able to give a lead to
others.
The summary in para. 2 itself gives senior officers a consolidated
account of what is involved over the whole range of the effort, which is
a start. This section sets out in more detail guiding principles for
senior officers when building up and integrating a public relations
effort with their other
administrative tasks.
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0403236
G.F. 323
!
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decentralised
Argument (by DDIS) for a
information system in Hong Kong
INTRODUCTION
!
The following paper was produced originally as a background to
certain detailed proposals concerning the organisation of information
services. It attempts to put the need for a continuing and increased
public information effort in the context of the present phase of
confrontation. As such, the paper may be of interest to Heads of
Departments and other senior Government officers who may not be directly
involved at present in information work but who, as the last three
paragraphs suggest, may now be called upon to take a much greater part
in these affairs.
0 0 0 0 0 0 0
[CONFIDENTIAL
To those engaged in public information work it might well seem
incredible at this late stage of events to have to justify a greater
effort in this field. Since the Communists began in May their determined
attempt to shake the basis of the Hong Kong Administration public
information work of many kinds has been one of our main weapons. The
very fact that today it is necessary once more to build up an enthusiasm
for public information work is to some extent a reflection of our
success in that we have, as we moant to dɔ, given people confidence that
the Hong Kong Government and its security forces were capable of
containing and limiting if not climinating the Communist threat and that
behind that protection life could return to normal.
2.
Throughout this poriod we have had occasion to recognize this
fact and to recognize also that it can be at tine dangerous. Other
administrations in similar circumstances have met the same problem of
maintaining public confidence simultaneously with public readiness to
take firm and effective measures. This really involves two quite
contradictory operations at the same time: one to mininse the threat and
maximize confidence in the Government ability to deal with it and the
second to prevent the public from becoming complacent, to persuade them
to accept and support strong measures which they may even find
inconvonicnt and distasteful by reminding them that the threat still
exists.
3.
The dilemma is even more evident within the Government. As far as the
public is concerned it is possible to risk quite a largo degree of
complacency if confidence is the more important objective. But all those
branches of Government directly involved in moeting the Communist threat
require the active appreciation and support of the rest of the
Government which will not be available if they have any false or
complacent feeling about the situation. This applies to the security
forces who must continue to take measures which are inconvenient and
perhaps also costly as well as to the information organization. There is
good authority, on the basis of adequate experience in other similar
situations, for recognizing that at this time an accelerated and
expanded programmo of public information is more rather than less
neccssary. It is also a time when the objectives of our programme will
not be so obvious as when the public can see clearly the confrontation
between the forces of law and order and the mobs in the streets or the
bomb throwers. If we are committed to anything we are now committed to a
fierce battle for the hearts and minds of the population. We have to
make as many people as possible conscious of, grateful for and loyal to
this administration for the benefits it brings to thom and which they
are not willing to let go. We must make them appreciative of what the
Government has done for them already, we must exploit to the full the
things we are doing now and which we plan to do in the future and if for
any reason we are unable to meet their expectations in any field we have
to be convincing in our explanations
or cxcuses.
4.
Our confrontation with the Communists has shaken the
assumption that Hong Kong can simply continue to promote its own
prospority with an indifferent China in the background. All of us who
live here as well as those who do business with Hong Kong, are
CONFID
- 2.
CONFIDENTIAL
now conscious of the threat which China's strength and aggressive
demeanour pose to the Colony. In view of the statements made by the
Communists locally and in official Peking organs it is not surprising
that many people assume that China can and may destroy, suddenly or
gradually, the British administration in Hong Kong. Unfortunately the
simplest method of allaying that anxiety, by referring to the large
rolitical and economic issues involved, are not ojen to us because
Jublic com.ents on such matters (as well as diplomatic action) are the
prerogative of the British Government and not of the Hong Kong
Government, and certainly not of its spokesman.
If
5.
Confidence both within Hong Kong and abroad must therefore
be promoted to a large extent indirectly. If the confidence does not
exist then several consequences would eventually follow. If the
Communists resume violent assaults upon law and order we shall not be
sure how far we can rely upon the public to support the Government. the
Communists change their tactics, avoid violence, and hogin a scientific
attack upon the various institutions of Government and our society
generally, exploiting grievances and relating them to a general
dissatisfaction (as they have orenly promised to do) then we shall be
faced with a steady of erosion of ṛublic support. In such an atmosphere
of uncertainty those who could leave Hong kong would do so or send their
children abroad and, because their children would be the better educated
part of the younger generation and Hong Kong, would thereby be weakencd/
Externally there will be some direct and immediate results of such a
situation. For example tourism can and will suffer if there is doubt
about the ability of the Hong Kong Government to maintain reace and
stability. It is less certain to what extent our overall trade is
affected by these factors but it is generally agreed that in the long:
term there would be a considerable effect if buyers, who have to think
ahead for several years are not sufficiently confident about Hong Kong
to put all their ergs in our basket.
6.
That there has been and still is at the time of writing a lull in the
confrontation is evident to everyone. It can be related to the
Communists' decision as how they wish to celebrate the National Day, in
an atmosphere of self congratulation rather than of conflict. It can be
related to possiblc directives from China showing that economics, and a
realization of the extent to which earnings through Hong Kong have been
lost since May, are once more taken precedence over politics. Internally
it can be related quite simply to a realization of the failure of the
previous violent line. Quite openly the local Communists admit that the
Hong Kong Police Force had proved too hard a nut for them to crack and
they are advocating a change to a more subtle form of subversion,
including of course subversion of the Folice Force.
It
may well prove advisable to encourage a degree of satisfaction about
this lull. It will not be advisable oven so for as the general public is
concerned to engender complacency. To some extent by talking about the
return of peace and normality we may in fact persuade some of the enemy
to want such a return. On the other hand even when the public is con-
cerned we may hove to keep them alive to the danger of the new Communist
line. Certainly as far as the Government is concerned overy- one should
be aware of these dangers and there should be no complacency.
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7.
At the same
3-
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LCON
time as they are made to realize the exact
nature of the threat as it is now morging Government officers should
realize our own objective which takes into account the reality of the
Chinese Communists' presence.
This is a subtle and difficult situation and the exploitation of public
information for maintenance of public confidence and public support in
this situation calls for a greater effort and greater understanding than
ever bofore.
8.
In the first piras: of violent confrontation our propaganda has been
largely a rasponse to Communist actions and these actions them- selves
have been so unpopular that the public could casily be persuaded to
reject them. The other factor in the first stage was the simple but, in
Hong Kong, the over-riding question are the authorities physically
strong enough to deal with the Communists? Fortunately the Police laft
no doubt this as the Communists have openly recognised.
9.
As
In the second phrase of 'underground' confrontation thoro
will be no such simple issues, no such easy appeal and no such asy
demonstration of Government's ability to win. We shall have to prove
everything as we go along. We are not in the habit of doing this. far as
public information is concerned we are rather in the habit of assuming
that reasonable people would appreciate what we have done and if people
do not appreciate the Government for its undoubted achievements on their
behalf it is because they are either stupid or malicious. Therefore we
have to spend a lot of effort showing how progressive our policies ars
and making people appreciative of them.
50.
To some
10.
There are high expectations about further progross. extent
this is a very fortunate situation (as the Communist would say) for the
Hong Kong Government. lthough they could have done it the Communists
have not yet campaigned in the fields where there is an obvious need for
further progress although they may do so at any minute. In other words
they have not taken up our options before us are ready to do
We are still therefore in a position to claim all the credit
although we may not be in tha fortunate position much longer.
fortunate position much longer. To quite a large extent this is not a
matter of making vast and hasty changes in policy but of exploiting our
present intentions or changing them slightly so that they can seem to
fit in with popular expectation to a greater extent, Presentation is the
key to the whole thing. Confidence and loyalty are Lnotemotional and
logical things and can be encouraged emotionally but not
logically. The excessive application of logic is more likely to dismay.
11.
The basis for this paper is the assumption that the various
facilities and methods hitherto employed in public information work are
not sufficient in themselves for a positive and effective programme of
'winning hearts and minds'. A public information programme with that
broad objective will embrace very much more than the conventional
methods currently available. It will employ, in addition, to the access
to the pross and the various other publicity techniques which the
Information Services has developed, every other passible muans of
communication with the public whether in small groups sharing particular
and special interests or as a whole.
ONFIDENTIAL
In secking procice t'rgets (which is what the Communists
promise to do) the Government's public information programme will have
to exploit every means of identifying and reaching sectional interests.
Those depa tments which have contact with or knowledge of such groups
will have to design material calculated to appeal to them and even to
act as the means of communication, In other words there is a new +
positive and active role for all the departments of Government.
13.
love
But these departments will not only have to represent
themselves to their own specialised targets, they will have to represent
Government as a whole to the whole public. so s.nior officer will have
to learn not only to do a good job, but to be seen doing it and to
relate the good job they are seen doing convincingly to the overall
purpose of the Government. While this is in no sense sclf-glorification
for senior civil servents it does call for a personal effort and a
personal exposure which is not natural to civil servants and which in
other places is the proper field of clected ministers. Since there are
none such here we cannot let the case go by default. Senior officers
must take upon then- selves personally much of the responsibility for
projceting the desired image of Government in human teras as an
organization which has taken the trouble to understand what the people
need and expect and is taking wisc stops to meet those needs and
expectations,
14.
In this task senior civil servants will expect to receive sound
technical advice and be assisted by the various technical serviccs of
professional publicity, but the Lanctus will come from them. They, and
the Government as a whole must be convinced with the urgent neccssity to
win active and conscious support for the Government, to assist by
whatever meons in their power the development of the necessary machinery
and techniques and to play their part in their use.
CONFIDENT
9
004.1967
1
CONFIDENTIAL
Notes on the Structure and Organisation
of Information Services
Part I
This consideration of the future structure of information services in
the Hong Kong Government arises immediately from the need to determine
the future of the Special Publicity Unit.
2.
The S.P.U. was set up in June to meet the obvious need for
counter-propaganda and to develop positive propaganda on a "hearts and
minds" basis. The S.P.U. was set up for an initial period of six months
as an off-shoot of the Information Services Department on to which in
turn, were grafted personnel from the Secretariat for Chinese affairs,
Radio Hong Kong and the Police Force. From the beginning the Unit's
operations have been guided by a committec under the chairmanship of the
Deputy Colonial Secretary and latterly the Deputy Colonial Secretary
(Special Duties).
3.
Soon after the formation of the Unit the Committee accepted
the view that there would be a need for an organisation similar to the
Unit continuing far beyond the original, and purely notional, six months
which expire in December 1967, and that a decision on this must be taken
soon if only to ensure proper recruitment or the replacement in their
parent departments of seconded staff.
4.
The Deputy Director of Information Services was asked to suggest the
future role and organisation of the S.P.U. but his report was delayed
until now as a result of his commitments as Acting Director during
August and September.
5.
The very fact that a special unit had to be set up demonstrates
one shortcoming of the original Information Services Department which
was of course symptomatic of a generally passive attitude to information
work throughout the Government. This fact alone suggests that it is not
worth examining the role of the S.P.U. without examining the total
pattern of information work as it is now seen to be required.
6.
During these four months, quite apart from the specialised and
novel functions of the S.P.U., the pressure put upon the con- ventional
services of the I.S.D. have high-lighted many of its inadequacies.
7.
Without further apology, then, the opportunity has been taken to
ezanine the whole pattern of information work and to make suggestions
for a radical change.
8.
On the one hand the Hong Kong Government Information
/Services
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ii
L
Services Department is a highly professional and efficient machine for
the dissemination of official information and the preparation of
publicity material. The expenditure of money and talent on this service
should indicate the extent of the Government's concern to keep the
public and particularly the communications media informed,
9.
On the other hand the Information Services Department is poorly thought
of by the public, distrusted or resented by many other Government
departments and certainly by many individual civil servants and openly
and frequently attacked by the press.
10.
It may be said on the latter point that no official information |
service can hope to endear itself to the press who must on principle
regard it as a hindrance to their free access to original sources of
information. But this cannot explain the regular condemnation of the
department. In the past month two British national newspapers, the Daily
Express and Daily Telegraph, have gone out of their way to print reports
by their staff correspondents criticising the service of the department.
One cannot find parallels for this in other situations where
correspondents might be thought to have met similar frustrations at the
hands of official information departments.
11.
It is possible, though probably not profitable, to suggest historical
reasons for various resentments which exist among foreign
correspondents, local journalists and among other departments. But some
of the friction can only be traced to the structure of the department
and its relation to other departments and can only be cured by literally
breaking the present structure of information services and reforming it
so as to meet new conditions and requirements.
12.
This is an urgent requirement because the relative
popularity of the Information Services Department is something more than
a matter of personal concern to the officers concerned. The test of the
department's value is the acceptability of the information it
distributes and if, as scems only too clear, that acceptability is
reduced a drastic remedy is urgently required.
13.
In fact acceptability of material from the department has reached on
occasions such a low level that it can really be said to amount to the
famous "credibility gap" and that is a situation which cannot be
tolerated for a moment.
+
14.
In the international sphere Hong Kong depends more than anywhere else in
the world on a correct, firm and appreciative understanding. Locally,
the Government in the absence of other channels of communication relies
heavily upon the medium of the department to create appreciative
understanding of its actions and policies.
15.
A starting point for the examination of the performance of the present
information services is their place in the Government organisation with
its advantages and draw-backs.
16.
The department grow rapidly from a simple PRO function to a
fully-fledged department largely through the drive and energy of its
first director. It is certainly to the Government's advantages that he
was able to establish the importance of information work, and
/particularly
Levine Defto
i
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H
3
particularly its employment as a tool of policy which is recognised, for
example, by the attendance of the D.I.S. at Executive Council and other
policy making meetings. The purpose is more than to give him an early
sight of matters which it may later fall to him to deal with. The
important point is the recognition that the way in which a intter say or
can be handled publicly is a prime factor in reaching a decision.
17.
It may well be, however, that the very drive and energy
exhibited by the first director in establishing his department and
extracting recognition for its role created resistances of their
However unfortunate and improper this reaction may have been it is a
factor which cannot be ignored in assessing present attitudes, within
the Government, to the department and more importantly to
own.
information work.
18.
It is not only that personal resentments linger but there has never been
a willing acceptance of the centralised information system among other
departments any more than among the press,
19.
Until recently all dealings with the press had to be conducted
through the department and the concept is unrealistically enshrined in
General Orders. The inevitable result has been to diminish the interest
of departments in information work and of course to make some civil
servants look rather stupid when instead of answering a simple question
they had to refer the caller to the I.S.D. (The poor impression was
usually compounded when the enquirer found that the I.S.D. did not know
the answer either and had to refer to the department, and probably to
the man, who received and declined to answer the original enquiry.)
20.
In so far as this rigid rule was relaxed it was often only to the extent
of a department answering easy questions, or whose answers reflected
well upon the department themselves, but referring the sticky ones to
I.S.D. with the excuse that this was the rule which they were not
allowed to break.
21.
From the point of view of the press these antics were unjustifiable and
they cumulatively diminished respect for I.S.D.
22.
The only radical departure from this pattern has been the
posting of one officer (of too low a grade) to Police Headquarters and
the current proposals for a properly constituted Public Relations Unit
for the Police Force. With that cxception the I.S.D. retains its central
control over not just the policy of information and publicity on behalf
of Government and its component departments, which is wise, but over the
machinery of communication which is unwise and wasteful.
23.
The fact that information services arc conducted by e
department constructed like other Government departments inevitably
affects the readiness of other departments to accept direction from the
I.S.D. on matters which, not surprisingly, they believe themselves
/competent
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competent to deal with. It also militates against the effective
performance of information functions.
24.
Close observation suggests in fact that for effective operation a
departmental organisation with its notions, or obligations of pyramidal
seniority structure are antagonistic if not fatal to useful and
productive information work.
25.
"Parkinson's Law" operates with relentless power in such place as the
1.S.D..press room where titles of seniority proliferate and promotion
dependent on the efficient performance of information tasks Icads
inevitably to administrative posts where those talents are unused. The
most glaringly obvious feature of the press relations work of the
department at the present time is that the critical part of the work is
being done by those least fitted for it. Those bost able to do it are
engaged on tasks which make no demands on the skills they have
laboriously and, for the Government, expensively acquired and on the
basis of which they earned their promotion.
26.
All newspapermen and many Government officers who have dealings with the
department's press room on a day-to-day basis, and on the level at which
normal routine enquiries are handled, have the same impression of the
low-calibre of the officers they deal with. There is bound to be a
general feeling that the man docs not grasp the subject he is dealing
with. Senior Government officers expecting to receive careful
professional advice on scrious matters speak of having little confidence
in these officers. Yet it is the handling of those day-to-day routine
enquiries which form the backbone of the Government's information work.
27.
In a situation where an enquiring newspaperman, or a senior Goverment
officer only feels he will get satisfaction if he approaches a senior
officer of I.S.D. one is bound to ask why there is so much reliance on
so many ill-equipped juniors.
28.
There are many reasons. They include the fact that I.S.D. has
given a lead to other departments in this policy of local recruitment,
often in the face of good sense from all other points of view. (Local
journalists who would press as a matter of public policy for local
recruitment would put the efficient handling of press enquiries far
higher in the list of priorities.)
29.
Another factor is certainly the policy of recruiting journalists
wherever possible. This again dates back to the original director who
had some journalistic experience himself and subscribed to the belief
that only journalists could speak to journalists. This is an easy axion
to accept but will not stand examination. Perhaps in the first place it
applies more readily in countries where journalists are of a higher
standard than in Hong Kong. But it is not likely to be true that a bad
or mediocre journalist is the best person to speak to a journalist. For
many years I.S.D. has been recruiting steadily
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+
from the ranks of a press whose poor standards the many people deplore
and we can only console ourselves with the thought that I.S.D. has been
getting the best (which may not have been a good thing for local
journalism, or Hong Kong).
30.
Experience actually shows that journalists do not want to talk
to other journalists now cmployed in information services and in fact
tend to distrust them. The only argument in favour of the employment of
journalists is that by their knowledge of technique they are able to
avoid pitfalls which gape before the layman dealing with a reporter.
This however is an advantage which can be secured by the employment in
key positions of some journalists and does not necessarily justify
nothing but journalists.
31.
It is worth trying to create a system which uses professional officers
as such to a greater degree than is possible at present. To some extent
it happens in any organisation, and particularly in Government
departments with a professional function, that the necessary
administrative duties absorb the best professional talents. But the
situation in information work is not quite the same as in other
Government services. In other departments it is likely to be the senior
officers of the department who bear the burden of contact with the
public if any while their juniors feed them with material. Thus the
public impression of the department is formed by contact with the abler
and more experienced of the staff. In I.S.D. where impression counts
even more than usual cxactly the opposite happens and the impression
which our highly critical customers have of us is formed from their
contact with relatively inexperienced and less capable staff.
32.
The result is too often a poor impression which cannot be crased by more
occasional contact with the higher grades.
33.
This problem cannot be solved so long as the present
departmental structure remains. Promotion, which inevitably removes 'the
best officers from the work they do best, is the only avenue to
the proper rewards for their ability. To keep them at their pro-
fessional tasks and to hand over administration to a different class of
officers will not solve the problem if they are consequently denied
advancement. However, a solution would be possible if the departmental
structure were entirely broken and the professionals were in long-scale
grades comparable to the administrative service. This radical re-
organization would also solve other problems which now limit the
efficiency of information services.
34.
The departmental structure wastes the abilities of its best
officers and puts the weakest officers in the most vulnerable position.
It also sets up certain resistances in other departments which directly
reduce the efficiency of information work and, more significantly,
reduce interest in what should be a vital spect of all departmental
operations.
35.
There is another unfortunate effect of the departmental
structure in that it leads to a routine attitude to information work.
/Finding
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Finding themselves in a machine with rigid seniority levels and rigidly
delineated responsibilities information officers begin to see their work
in terms of their output rather than the effect of it. Over the years
the department has settled down to a routine in which success is
measured by the comprehensiveness and regularity of the material issued
and not by its effect on the public mind.
36.
This explains the apparent paradox of an information department
which is much admired for its organisation and the methods it employs
but as much reviled for failing to do its real job. The press room of
the Hong Kong 1.S.D. is much better equipped than any comparable
organisation, on a superficial assessment better staffed, and is in a
better position in the Government organisation to make information
policy work effectively. But its shortcomings are constantly brought to
notice where less well organised services are treated with respect and
affection.
37.
To some extent the very efficiency and comprehensiveness of the
I.S.D. is its own worst enery. It is too obtrusive. The journalist
enmeshed in the system feels inevitably that he is getting a "snow-job",
a machine made substitute for real live information, and however
unjustified this suspicion may be it is a factor in the acceptability of
the output of I.S.D. which we must deal with.
38.
It is
The mere size of the establishment is suspicious. a "machine". Its
establishment is 140! By the time you have mentioned that figure it is
too late to point out that this includes 14 messengers, 17 clerks etc.
not to mention that many of these officers are engaged on specialist
duties like poster production or film-making. There is an irremovable
suspicion that this great organisation, which promises so much with its
big staff, spacious offices, teleprinter networks, somehow doesn't live
up to the promise.
39.
Most people are incurably sceptical of professional public
relations organisations. While they will accept architecture, medicine
or accountancy as fields for specialisation they sub- consciously resent
the idea that the communication of ideas, especially the communication
of ideas about their own work is something they cannot handlc for
themselves. It is possible by example to demonstrate to such people that
a professional organisation can help them to "put themselves over" but
the establishment of I.S.D. as a separate, and in a sense "rival"
department, makes other departments less likely to seek such help than
if they had the assistance of their own public relations expert.
40.
The chief argument against the haphazard proliferation of departmental
public or press-relations functions has been and still is that in a
small territory where all operations arc subject to the same political
considerations there must be a recognised and uniformly applied public
information policy.
41.
The solution seems to lic therefore in two directions
/at
تھا
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at once ami they need not conflict. must be exercised in a way which
does not arouse resentment or stifle
On the one hand policy control
departmental initiative. On the other hand the major departments should
as far as possible speak, and be seen to be speaking for themselves.
Undoubtedly this will release a tremendous amount of public relations
good-vill which will vitally affect relations between the Government and
the people.
42.
The way to meet the first requirement is to disband the I.S.D. as a
department and to establish information policy control as an arm of the
central secretariat organisation on the lines of the Finance or
Establishment branches while executing much of the policy at
departmental level. It would only be necessary to retain a small
professional organisation to deal with those aspects of Government
action which were not the fields of identifiable departments or to
handle the public and press relations of those departments which are not
large enough or suitable for the establishment of their olm information
units. Additionally there would be certain centralised services such as
are presently provided by the various specialised sections of the
I.S.D. - Film Unit, Photographic Section and Library, Distribution
Section, Design and Display Section, Publishing Section, Overseas
Features Editing Section, all of which are at present under the control
of the department's Chief Publicity Officer.
43.
The catablishment of the Director of I.S.D. and his deputy es members of
the Secretariat responsible for policy advice and control in information
matters would be a stop really no more novel than having a political
advisor, a financial secretary or an establishment officer and might in
fact be a much more logical recognition of the relationship of the head
of information servicca to the central Government. Outwardly it would
demonstrate in most welcome fashion the recognition by the central
Government that public opinion is a factor to be calculated at every
step in our future progress.
44.
Functionally these changes would not prevent the head of the
information services, who might be known as Information Secretary, from
exercising direct control over his central servicing sections and over a
small but high calibre section dealing with central Government matters.
His control over information work in independently staffed departments
would be necessarily indirect but the new relationship might make it
more cffective and would certainly make it more productive.
45.
The breaking-up of the I.S.D. would provide an opportunity to
reward intelligent informulion staff for being good at their jobs
instead of offering as the sole reward removal from those jobs.
46.
It would be necessary to fill a larger number of posts at a higher level
but it would be possible to dispense with much of the infra-structure of
junior grades who have proved in practice to be incapable of development
to really useful status.
47.
It would also be possible to associate with this new concept the
introduction of non-journalist Government officers, apart
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8
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iron mu recruits, and so develop the potential for better public
relations which has undoubtedly been stifled by the over-centralised
role of 1.S.D.
48.
The practice of the Foreign Office is a good example of the advantage of
making information work one of the postings for every officer in his
tinc.
49.
Such a development would parallel the posting within departments of
departmental officers to work for a time side by side with
"professional" information officers.
50.
Such a concept for the administration of information policy
and the execution of information services would, to get back. to the
origimml intention of this report, allow for the logical inclusion of
the function now performed by the Special Publicity Unit.
31.
The detailed proposals for the overall disposition of
information personnel are made in Part II, and the proposels for the
S.P.U. in Part III,
CONFIDENTIAL
Fart II
The staff of the Information Services department is presently disposed
as follows.
1 Director
1
Ilotes
Deputy Director (supernumerary) to replace the sub-
1
Chief Press Officer
1
Press Officer
4 Senior Information Officer;
10 Information Officers
14 Assistant Information Officers
Class I
4 Assistant Information Officers
Class II
stantive deputy now with the S.P.U.
the substantive post
of the present
supernumerary deputy is unfilled.
Subordinates not yet fit to act.
graded P. I 0.
including one super- numerary post for the Hong Kong office in London,
and one for the Folice Information office (presently with- drawn to make
up staff deficiencies). One of these S.I.O. posts is associated with the
radio news operation.
3 are supernumerary, and held against the supernumerary S.1.0. posts
mentioned above. 4 of these work on radio news.
4 of these work on radio news.
Chief Publicity Officer
4 Principal Information Officers.
each controlling a sec- tion providing a specialised service: Films,
Fublicity, Editorial, and Display and Design.
/Senior
CONFIDENTIAL
2.
4 Senior Information Officers
5 Information Officers
3
Assistant Information Officers Class I
5 Assistant Information Officers mostly photographers
Class II
or techncians in the Film Unit.
That makes a total of fifty-eight professional officers of various
grades spread around the various publicity and information function of
the department.
3.
The balance is made up of the kind of support to
organization one would expect:
1 Frincipal Information Officer who is general
advise on matters of Chinese language and style
2 Executive Officers
4 Iersonal Secretaries
1 Confidential Assistant
1 Shorthand Audio-typist
4 typists
2 telephone operators
1 stores supervisor
7 clerks
1 chauffeur
3 drivers
4
office attendants
4.
14 messengers
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