Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 1 Jul 1931

Vol. 39 No. 10

In Committee on Finance. - Vote 13—Civil Service Commission.

Mr. Blythe

I move:—

Go ndeontar suim ná raghaidh thar £8,806 chun slánuithe na suime is gá chun íoctha an Mhuirir a thiocfaidh chun bheith iníoctha i rith na bliana dar críoch an 31adh lá de Mhárta, 1932, chun Tuarastail agus Costaisí Coimisiún na Stát-Sheirbhíse (Uimh. 5 de 1924 agus Uimh. 41 de 1926) agus an Choimisiúin um Cheapacháin Aitiúla (Uimh. 39 de 1926).

That a sum not exceeding £8,806 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1932, for the salaries and expenses of the Civil Service Commission (Nos. 5 of 1924 and 41 of 1926) and of the Local Appointments Commission (No. 39 of 1926).

Mr. MacEntee

I notice amongst the extra receipts paid to the Exchequer in connection with this Vote there is £2,220 for fees paid by candidates for the Civil Service and £1,300 for fees paid by candidates for local appointments. I should like if the Minister could give the House any idea as to the number of candidates examined by the Local Appointments Commission and the Civil Service Commission respectively.

Mr. Blythe

So far as the year ending 31st March last was concerned the number of recommendations made by the Local Appointments Commission was 286: 109 nurses, 26 midwives, 59 medical officers, 23 veterinary inspectors, 13 surveyors, 12 town clerks, and various smaller numbers.

Mr. MacEntee

Would the Minister say how many candidates there were?

Mr. Blythe

I am afraid I could not.

Mr. MacEntee

The reason I ask is that a number of people have complained to me of the fees charged in respect of some of these examinations, which seem to be very high. I think in the case of medical appointments the fee is as high as £2. In that connection, I may say, that there is a general feeling among the medical profession, at any rate, and I suppose it applies to other professions also, that it would be very desirable if the Local Appointments Commission in advertising posts would state precisely the academic qualifications which are required, because it has been pointed out to me that a man has absolutely no chance of knowing whether he would be considered for a position which is vacant unless he pays his £2 and receives the conditions and has appeared before the Local Appointments Commission. In consequence of that a number of candidates for posts have paid fees and found they had no chance whatever of securing positions. If the Local Appointments Commission is to fulfil a useful purpose I suggest that the fees should be made as low as possible, so that there will be no undue obstacle placed in the way of those who wish to apply for appointments.

Mr. Blythe

I think this question of fees is one that gives the Commission some little difficulty. Part of the object in charging the fee is to recoup, to some extent at any rate, the expenses of the Commission. Another is really to reduce the number of candidates to those who are really serious. If you had no fee at all in certain cases you would have a great number. Even with the fee, if anybody will look at the lists he will see that there are great numbers of people who enter and who are quite hopeless. Without the fee the costs would be put up, and not only the costs, but the number of papers to be examined. The number of people to be accommodated in examination halls would go up enormously, and not only would increase the expenses, but waste time, and, to some extent, would tend to interfere with the efficiency of the examinations. While very little is stated in the advertisements about the qualifications for a post, because advertisements are costly, I think that when a candidate applies for the conditions and for the particulars he does receive a good deal of information before it is necessary for him to pay the fee. I shall give the Deputy a list of the fees for Civil Service examinations. For an officer in the Customs and Excise the fee is £2, and the salary scale £110 to £350; the same fee is charged for the junior executive examination, where the scale is £90 to £350; £1 is charged for the clerical officers examination, where the salary scale is £70 to £200; 10/- is the fee for shorthand typists, whose scale is from 24/- to 38/-; 10/- for writing assistants, where the salary scale is 17/- to 34/-, and 2/- for Post Office learners and boy messengers. Some of these fees seem relatively high, but of course the posts, as posts go in this country, are valuable enough, and even with these fees there is a very big entry, and, of course, there is a considerable entry of people who are not at all in the running. A reduction, while it might be justified from one angle, would cause loss in revenue. Perhaps you might make it up by getting larger numbers, but that would be hardly a good thing, because it is hard enough to get the papers dealt with at present in a reasonable time and by a reasonable number of people, and an enormous spreading out of the number of candidates, especially those who are not serious candidates, would increase the difficulty.

Mr. MacEntee

My difficulty in that direction is that certainly it has placed obstacles in the way of a number of people who might find it very hard to afford two pounds and yet might be quite brilliant people and would make good officers if recruited for the service, but they are debarred because of the fee. Even though it might create an administrative difficulty, nevertheless the proper way to approach this thing is that the widest possible section of the people should be permitted to sit for these examinations if they wish to enter the public service. To a certain extent I suppose the position might be met if the examination for the ordinary Leaving and Intermediate Certificate in the schools were co-ordinated or related in some way to the educational qualifications that would be required for entrance into the various branches of the Civil Service. In that way you could exact a qualifying condition that a candidate should have either the Leaving or Intermediate Certificate. That would narrow the field somewhat. At the same time it would not put an obstacle in the way of people who might find it difficult to afford £2 for an entrance fee for an examination for posts not too highly paid. They may be attractive to the candidates, but that is because of their immediate financial circumstances. It is those immediate financial circumstances that render it difficult for them to provide the £2.

The Minister said that the entrance fee is not a sufficient deterrent to people who are unfit and are not qualified to sit for the examination. It is only not a deterrent in the case of unqualified people who are able to provide the entrance fee, but it may be a deterrent in the case of desirable people who are unable to provide the entrance fee. I think it would be better to run the risk of having a larger number of unsuitable people for the examination because of the low fee rather than to prevent a number of people that would be suitable as candidates for the Civil Service sitting for the examination by reason of the high fee.

Mr. T.J. O'Connell

With regard to professional people who make application through the Local Appointments Commission, they have to pay a fee with each application. It is considered a hardship that in cases where a young professional man is in for an appointment he pays an appropriate fee, and, of course, though he may be called up for interview, only one can be appointed. Take the case of a doctor or an assistant surveyor or an engineer, or a man of that class. A vacancy may occur again the next month, and another fee has to be paid before the applicant can have his name put before the Selection Board. Could nothing be done by way of making reductions in subsequent applications after the first fee is paid? If one of the reasons for the payment of the fee is to see that a person is serious, the fact that he paid it once and is willing to pay a reduced fee again, would show that he is serious at any rate. I think it is rather hard that if a young man is not successful and has to make two or three attempts that he should have to pay a fee every time.

Mr. Blythe

It may be that there is a hardship there which is perhaps worthy of consideration. But in contradistinction to the case Deputy MacEntee put it is more important with regard to those appointments, to keep the numbers down as much as possible. If you are conducting a written examination you must print off the papers and pay fees to people to examine them, and all that must mean considerable expense. It is not so easy when dealing with the appointment of medical officers, because the principle has been to get representative men in the profession to sit on selection boards. It is often a great sacrifice for these men to do it. They have to remain away from their practice, and selection boards have sometimes sat several days in succession to interview candidates and make selections. Anything that would unduly increase the number of candidates would be very serious. It might just turn the scale between carrying on that system and not carrying it on. It is a matter that I would like to look into a little more. I feel that if a candidate has been up for a post or two if he has any nous at all, will be able to get some idea of what his chances are. He will find out what the qualifications of the successful candidate were, what his degrees were, and what sort of people were going. In that way he will be able, if in no other, to see what it was he lacked. I have heard candidates say so and so got the post because he had this or that degree, generally not claiming that the degree was much good when the other person had it. Nevertheless, he should be able to see in what the people who got the position excelled. I think the hardship seems not to be as great as it appears. However, it is a matter I will certainly discuss with the Commissioners.

Mr. de Valera

What about the case Deputy MacEntee raised in connection with Civil Service examinations?

Mr. Blythe

I do not know that I have anything more to say with regard to that. These things have been thrashed out a good deal by the Civil Service Commissioners, and I know they feel that good candidates have not been deterred. In fact no candidates have been deterred. I had occasion just recently to discuss the question of fees with the Civil Service Commissioners in connection with a particular appointment—as a matter of fact an appointment to the translators and whether people from poor areas in the Gaeltacht could pay the fee mentioned. Members of the Commission to whom I mentioned it said they did not agree that there was anything to indicate that good candidates were being deterred from coming forward by these fees.

Mr. de Valera

How could they come across them?

Mr. Blythe

They would get complaints. After all, people do write complaints. As a matter of fact, in this particular case one candidate wrote to say he was unable to pay the fee. If there were many cases of that kind you would have more complaints about them. I may say that while one particular candidate wrote to say that he could not pay the fee, when I spoke to the Commissioners about it I learned that he had managed to pay the fee somehow.

Dr. Hennessy

I would like to ask the Minister if he has given any consideration to some recommendations of the Dáil, in particular with regard to the periodical holding of sittings of the Commission to fill appointments, say, every quarter. There could easily be an estimate made by which approximately the potential number of vacancies would be known. It is an expensive thing for these candidates to attend meetings of the Commission. Many Irish doctors, temporarily in practice in England, have to come over for these interviews. Holding these sessions periodically would save a good deal of expense. At present it would look as if they had to come for one appointment, although I know the Appointments Commission have done their best to group their vacancies as much as possible. Travelling expenses are very heavy.

Mr. Blythe

It is clear that there would be certain advantages in that, but I do not know whether it could be done without an amendment of the Act. I doubt if they can do other than advertise the vacancies which do actually occur. Sometimes it happened that while filling a vacancy other vacancies have occurred. The difficulty that exists there is that the local authority is likely to complain if there is much delay, because they may be paying more to a substitute. It may be that it would be better to wait a little, at any rate, and to try to have two, three, or more vacancies. Of course, in the famous case of a librarian there were several vacancies, and that is possibly how the difficulty occurred.

Vote put and agreed to.