The Officers of the Commission; those who are largely dealing with the entire service of the Commission. The persons dealing with the Commission are persons who remain all the time and are appointed subject to the control of the Minister for Finance of the time. In that connection let me refer to Section 6. Section 6 states that the Minister for Finance and the Minister in charge of a Government Department shall consider
"(a) that the qualifications in respect of knowledge and ability deemed requisite for any particular situation to which this Act applies in that Government Department are wholly or in part professional or otherwise peculiar and not ordinarily to be acquired in the Civil Service and the Minister in charge of such Government Department shall propose to appoint to such situation a person who has acquired such qualifications in other pursuits, or.”
And this is so very important a Sub-Section that I am extremely surprised to see it in this Bill because whatever system we adopt surely this is a questionable provision;
"(b) That it would be for the public interest that the rules in regard to age and the whole or any part of the examination for such a situation as aforesaid should be dispensed with.”
That is a very remarkable provision. It may become, at any particular time, a very sinister provision. If that happened to be the case, "the Commissioners may," the Bill says, "if they think fit, grant their certificate of qualification in respect of such situation upon any evidence which is satisfactory to them that the person proposed to be appointed to such situation is fully qualified therefor in respect of age, health, character, knowledge and ability."
In other words, if the Ministers who are appointed by the Party of the day decide that it would be for the public interest, as they may hereafter interpret the public interest, that the rules set up by the Civil Service Commissioners may in whole or in part be set aside they shall make that recommendation to the Civil Service Commissioners, and the Civil Service Commissioners may, if they think fit, grant their certificate, although the terms of that certificate may not have been fulfilled. A very eminent Irishman spoke at one time of driving a coach and four through any Act of Parliament. I think a whole team of coaches and four could be driven through the provisions of this Act. But now, note Section 10. Section 10 depends upon the Schedule. In the Schedule to this Bill certain offices and functions are withdrawn as being inappropriate for the jurisdiction of the Civil Service Commissioners, and having read through these six paragraphs in the Schedule, I think most of us would be in agreement that they could all safely be withdrawn with one possible exception. But now turn to Section 10, and see how it affects the Schedule. Section 10, Sub-section (2), says "the Commissioners may by order made on the application of the Minister in charge of any Government Department and with the consent of the Minister for Finance add any situation in that Department to the Schedule to this Act." In other words, if the Minister for the day—it may be the Finance Minister, and I do not suppose that we shall always get Ministers quite so immaculate as those we now have the good fortune to possess—desires to withdraw, and he may be urged by his party that certain positions be withdrawn and placed in the Schedule, then they may be so withdrawn and placed in the Schedule, and persons may again walk through the loophole in the Act into the Civil Service, although they have not fulfilled the conditions of the Civil Service. I do think these are faults in this Bill. But I am now dealing with what I think is even a more important matter, and that arises out of the consideration put forward.
I do urge it would be for the satisfaction and confidence of the Civil Service as a whole if appointments to the Civil Service hereafter in the Free State were put into the control of an independent Civil Service Commission directly responsible to the Legislature as a whole, and that the Commission should have much more extended powers than the powers allotted to it here. The powers given to it under this Bill are very largely under the influence of the Ministry for the day and of the Minister for Finance. They are powers which, if this Bill is to embody a principle hereafter to be adopted, may be exerted by the Minister for Finance on many occasions, on the overwhelming number of occasions, for, let us say, purely financial reasons, but which may be often exercised, and which it is possible may be exercised, for reasons which shall not be financial, but purely political. I am not now stating my own gloomy prognostications for the future, which the future may not fulfil; but this has proved to be the experience of other States, as I will show later. The reason why Canada adopted the particular form of Civil Service Commission that I am now urging the adoption of was because that has proved to be the case there, although they have been working for over sixty years now. In Canada these evils have proved to be the case from experience, and they have had to work out of the kind of Commission outlined in this Bill into the kind of other Commission that I am now recommending—an independent Commission—a Commission holding the same relation to the Legislature as the Comptroller and Auditor-General. The Commission there is entirely responsible to Parliament as a whole for all Civil Service appointments, transfers, and arrangements; and if some of those transfers should happen to be suggested by the Ministry as being desirable by them, they may be suggested by the Ministry and are considered by the Commission; but for the transfers themselves it is the Commission that is ultimately responsible. Now, having had occasion to give this matter a good deal of thought for some time, I believe on its merits, not merely as a logical principle, but merely on its merits as arising from the experience of others, that that system would be very much better in this country under any circumstances. What I now desire to bring before the Dáil is the further consideration that in the circumstances—the peculiar and the particular circumstances of Ireland—this form of Civil Service Commission adopted by Canada is the one that will most wisely answer our difficulties and meet some problems which we will certainly have to face in the very near future. It is a matter of public knowledge—all know it as a matter of historic knowledge—that in Canada there are religious difficulties which are also present in this country, and we know that there has been very keen and very fierce party strife over a large number of years. The spoil system, such as prevailed in the United States, prevailed in Canada. In 1908 the Liberal Premier of that time established a Civil Service Commission on the lines of the English Civil Service Commission, but it was found more and more necessary to work away from that principle. The Premier of the opposite party, the Conservative Party, Sir Robert Borden in 1918-19 adopted the system that I am now recommending, with the result that the Civil Service Commission since then has become a settled body, which has not been raided by the political party of the day. Now, I wish to draw attention to a matter of very considerable importance, because since Sir Robert Borden, the Conservative Premier, adopted the principle in full that I have defined and am now urging, there has been a General Election. The Liberal Party was brought in, and was urged by its supporters during the whole course of the election, and even gave pledges to that effect, that the Civil Service system adopted by the outgoing Premier should be overthrown in order that the new Liberal Party should be able to reward its party with Civil Service appointments. The party came in upon that pledge. It came in and found the Civil Service with such a sense of confidence in the Commission that had been set up that although it has since been urged, and may at this very moment be urging, that the achievement of the Civil Service Commission on the lines I have stated should be put aside in the interests of party appointments. Mr. MacKenzie King has so far refused to listen to any of the interested advice that he has received, because he has found that an independent Civil Service Commission— a Commission responsible, not primarily to his Government, but to Parliament as a whole—gave a security and confidence that he desired to see maintained in the needs of the efficiency of the service. I would like to read just a few words from a quarterly magazine in which this matter, by chance I found, has been dealt with. It says:
"It happened, however, that the Liberals had been the last victims of the patronage system; after the 1911 elections thousands of Civil Servants who had been found guilty of Liberal politics had been ruthlessly dismissed from their posts. In Quebec and the Maritime Provinces, where the purge had been particularly drastic and the desire for revenge had burned deep in many bosoms, Liberal candidates in 1921 had blithely assured the electors that the abolition of patronage had only been one of the many monstrous follies of the Coalition Government, and that the fine old system of `spoils to the victors' would be restored as soon as a sane and intelligent Liberal administration was seated in power in Ottawa. But after this day dawned, the passing months brought no sign of the great restoration which would open the doors to the faithful. Angry deputations descended upon Ottawa and Liberal members became afraid to visit their homes. When they explained that the Civil Service Reform Act barred any reward for faithful partisanship, they were bidden to destroy the hated thing. Driven to despair they applied pressure upon the Government, and the latter in face of the opposition of most of the Conservatives and Progressives secured authority for a parliamentary committee which was charged with the duty of examining the workings of the Civil Service Reform measures and the Civil Service Commission and suggesting improvements."
It goes on to state that that Committee is now sitting but that it is unlikely that any change will be made because of the benefits that have been conferred by the kind of Commission that has been adopted.
