Vol. 217 No. 11
I move:
That a sum not exceeding £12,500 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, 1966, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Civil Service Commission and of the Local Appointments Commission.
I have had occasion to raise in the House over the past year the unfair practice of the Civil Service Commissioners in disqualifying a candidate in a certain examination without giving him the reason for the disqualification. Only following acrimonious questions in this House and correspondence over a period of more than two years were the reasons finally given. The Minister, who was a practising lawyer before he became a Minister, would appreciate the necessity for informing any accused person of the offences with which he is charged. It is a necessary prerequisite of justice. If the person is to be disqualified in an examination, whether it is for copying from another candidate or getting assistance from books and so on, he should be told precisely the nature of the offence he is suspected of having committed.
Before the person can answer a charge satisfactorily, he must know the nature of the charge against him. In this case the nature of the charge was not made known until a period of over two years had elapsed from the time the original complaint was made. It so happens that this candidate has not yet got through. I do not know if the matter has been satisfactorily dealt with. Such an occurrence can blight a person's career. This man's chances of promotion in his job are now gone forever. I am not concerned whether the person in question was in the right or in the wrong but I am concerned that the Civil Service Commissioners should not have informed this person who was suspected of an offence the precise nature of the offence, with the result that he was not in a position to know what defence he should offer to the suspicions against him.
I should like to comment also on the question of the Local Appointments Commission disqualifying a candidate after he has, in fact, been notified that he has passed an examination, passed his medical test, and has actually been filling the job for a number of years. He is then disqualified without any reason being given. This happened to a very decent man in the employment of the Department of Posts and Telegraphs. Possibly he is the same person about whom Deputy Ryan spoke.
For a number of years he was employed as a temporary postman. He did a confined examination for a permanent position. He was placed seventh at that examination, seventh in the whole country. After he had been notified of the fact that he had passed and that his medical history was satisfactory, he was informed he could not be employed. The matter was discussed by way of question and answer on a number of occasions here but no satisfactory explanation was given.
I think it is a shocking thing that that young man, his wife and family should be left under suspicion, the suspicion that he did something which prevented him from being appointed as a permanent postman, despite the fact that no evidence whatever was submitted. I am sure the Minister will, as his predecessor did, and as I am sure his successor will, keep the man in temporary employment, but it is just not good enough that the Local Appointments Commission should be entitled to stain a man's character without giving any explanation. The sooner that sort of thing is cleared up the better it will be.
This is one case, but the fact that one decent man has had his character besmirched because of the failure of the Local Appointments Commission to give the necessary information, should be sufficient to warrant a change in the law. I suggest that the Minister should do something about it now. The very least the man is entitled to is information as to why he was turned down. If he got that information the possibility is that everybody would be satisfied, but every effort to get that information has been foiled by the Local Appointments Commission who say they have decided that they will not give any explanation. I know of one or two other cases. They were not so serious because the information that the person had been successful was not so widespread. Consider the position of a young man rearing a family in a country town subject to all the embarrassment caused by this stupid regulation.
I have no knowledge of the two cases referred to, but I have a recollection of Deputy Ryan asking my predecessor a series of Parliamentary questions. I must admit I did not follow very closely——
It was hard to follow.
——but I remember the Minister for Finance, Dr. Ryan, saying that there was some act that the person should have done in order to get the information. He did not do this. Now this is only a hazy recollection. There was some omission on his part which he did not repair. Had he repaired the omission, he would have got the information he sought. Nevertheless, I sympathise with the point of view put forward by both Deputies. Without examining the whole matter more closely, however, I should not like to give an undertaking that I would direct, if I have that power, the Commissioners to desist from that practice and conform with what would appear to be reasonable requirements. In my experience as Minister for Industry and Commerce, I know that, on certain occasions, when industrial grant applications were made and refused, the reasons for the refusal could not be disclosed.
No one's character was interfered with by refusing to give a grant, but it is when you refuse to appoint a man as a postman.
In general, I have sympathy with the arguments made, but, without an opportunity of examining them home, I should not like to give any undertaking.
If we give the Minister the information, will he have the position examined?
Yes.
