I move amendment No. 89 :—
In subsection (2), line 11, before " reduce " to insert " for a prescribed reason ".
The effect of that amendment is that the Minister would make regulations governing the reduction of an N.C.O. and in accordance with those regulations could reduce the N.C.O.
I think that that amendment is acceptable.
I move amendment No. 90 :—
After sub-section (5), to add a new sub-section as follows :—
(6) No non-commissioned officer shall be reduced to a lower substantive non-commissioned rank unless the reasons for his proposed reduction have been communicated to him in writing by his Commanding Officer and he is given an opportunity of submitting in writing to the Adjutant-General his objections to the reduction and, on consideration of the objections, the Adjutant-General confirms and authorises the reduction.
I have often thought it very unfair that an N.C.O., say a sergeant, could be reduced to the rank of private and have no redress except under the provision dealing with the redress of wrongs which in fact is no redress at all. If it is proposed to reduce him I think that he should be notified in writing by his Commanding Officer and have the right to submit an objection to his reduction and that that objection should go to the Adjutant-General who is the person, subject to the Minister, who deals with questions of rank. Then the Adjutant-General having heard the reasons for his objections could confirm the reduction and reduce him; in other words machinery should be given to the man to object to his reduction. I think that the principle should be accepted and that this is a fair amendment.
While one might find some justification for the introduction of this section in normal peace time it would be very cumbersome in times of stress where the section would be most likely to arise. I wonder if Deputy Cowan has considered the normal organisation of the Army and the channels by which the thing would eventually arrive at the Adjutant-General—battalion, brigade, command would be the best way. I would have more sympathy with the amendment in its general principle if it were a question of going from the Commanding Officer to Brigade Commander. I do not know what the ministerial view is but I see difficulties in introducing a complete new section particularly in relation to emergency or war time.
I can say from my own experience that the section is satisfactory. I do not know whether it will alleviate any fears the Deputy may have, if I say that I am told that there is only about one such incident each year and that the Adjutant-General is the only officer delegated by the Minister to decide these issues. It is not the soldier's Commanding Officer. What happens is that if a Commanding Officer has inflicted on him an N.C.O. who may at one time have been good but who does not now carry out instructions and orders satisfactorly, the Commanding Officer tells him : " You will want to buck up and carry out instructions when you get them." After perhaps several warnings, he says : " I am going to recommend that you be reduced. You are no good to me," and eventually the case is brought before the Adjutant-General. He is the officer who deals with reductions and he deals with them as I would myself if they came to me. In other words, he examines the statements made by the Commanding Officer and if satisfied that the N.C.O. has deteriorated to the extent set out in the report, then, in the interests of the Army, the N.C.O. is reduced.
My experience has been that even where an N.C.O. is deteriorating they very often try to find some place to which he can be transferred rather than reduce him.
I should say that in general the tendency is not to give a man too hard a bump right away but there must come a time when an individual who is not carrying out his duties to the satisfaction of his Commanding Officer must go. He has either to do the job and do it efficiently or he must go.
I was aware when I put down the amendment that reductions of N.C.O.s were carried out on the orders of the Adjutant-General. That is why I put the amendment in the way I put it. From my own experience for a number of years in the Adjutant-General's department and as personal staff officer to the Adjutant-General, I was aware of the procedure. What I saw was that the Commanding Officer could have an objection to a particular N.C.O.—and I accept what the Minister says in a general way—and I have known cases in which a Commanding Officer and an N.C.O. were not hitting it off well and an injustice was done. A recommendation for the man's reduction came to the Adjutant-General and the case on paper was strong enough to justify the Adjutant-General or the Minister in reducing the man. What I have put in in this clause is that the Adjutant-General will inform the man's Commanding Officer that as a result of the report it was proposed to reduce this man "for the following reasons". The man is to get an opportunity of submitting a case and the particular N.C.O. could submit a very strong case in which he would point out that he was suffering from grave injustice, was being badly treated and that that bad treatment was due to a particular thing which he might point out and when the Adjutant-General received that objection, he would consider it judicially and, perhaps, send down some of the staff officers to investigate it and, perhaps, transfer the man to another unit under probation for a time. It was to put in as protection for the person who might be reduced by reason of the fact that there was some hostility between himself and the Commanding Officer that I put down the amendment. Unfortunately, that hostility does arise, though not very often, and we ought to provide, if we can, against any injustice. I am very strongly in favour of the amendment for the reasons I have given and if it is not accepted, I should like to have a division on it.
Would it be possible to get the same effect by an amendment of the redress of wrongs section ?
No. This deals specifically with where he is going to be reduced. You might have a sergeant reduced to the rank of private. I have seen many cases of that and, in ordinary justice, the man ought to be given an opportunity of making a case against it.
Would the case not be met if the reason for the proposed reduction were communicated to him in writing and leave it at that ? He could then put the other machinery into operation.
From my own experience of a number of Adjutants-General, they would be glad to have it. It is a very serious punishment to say to a man : "You are going to be reduced to a private ". It is a humiliating thing to himself, to his family and to everybody else and all I am asking is that he have an opportunity of sitting down and writing his objection to the Adjutant-General who will consider it. I know that the Adjutant-General, if it could come before him, would certainly consider his objection, but I want to make sure that he would have the right of going to the man who has the power to reduce him and saying : "I do not think it is fair. I have been treated unfairly. I had a row with the C.O. two years ago and that is the cause of this."
That is not what, in fact, happens. This is the case against Deputy Cowan's argument—if the man happens to be a company N.C.O., the company officer can only make a recommendation to the Commanding Officer. That is a safety valve immediately. Whatever grievance a company officer may have against a man,—and I doubt very much if an officer is in fact going to have a grievance against an N.C.O., other than that he is inefficient—he has to go to his battalion Officer Commanding, and the battalion Officer Commanding is going to examine the matter carefully before he adds his name to the recommendation to the Adjutant-General. It may even have to go beyond the battalion Officer Commanding—I am not sure of that but I imagine it does—but it eventually goes to the Adjutant-General with a complete statement of the case, and, as I already mentioned, there is only an average of one case a year. Deputy Cowan is discussing this as if there were innumerable cases.
No.
I said that there was on average less than one a year but we could call it an average of one a year. I can assure you that, although these cases are dealt with by the Adjutant-General, he frequently comes and discusses such matters with me, to have his own opinions reinforced. From that point of view, I can say that there is no question of a superficial decision. I have always found that the Army authorities regard it very seriously to reduce a man to a lower rank. They know the hardships and difficulties likely to arise from reduction. I am satisfied that there are not ordinarily any cases in which a personal grievance would be held against an N.C.O. by an officer. Where recommendations are made, they are made on good grounds and from that point of view I would have to resist this amendment.
Has the N.C.O. at any stage, from the time the complaint is lodged against him by his Commanding Officer, an opportunity of making his case ?
No.
The N.C.O. would be warned by his Commanding Officer that he was giving very unsatisfactory service and that, unless there were an improvement, he would find himself in the position of having to recommend reduction. I know that, in a particular case, that was done half a dozen times without resulting in any improvement in the individual.
He was given an opportunity——
He was warned that he would be recommended for reduction and it had no effect. The result was that the officer eventually had to make the recommendation.
I am afraid there is a slight misunderstanding and perhaps I myself was responsible in dealing only with a case in which a Commanding Officer recommended a reduction. I agree with the Minister from my own experience that it is not very often a Commanding Officer recommends an N.C.O. for reduction. But I have known cases—and these are the ones I am so strongly opposed to—in which, as a result of some court of inquiry, board of inquiry or something that comes into the Department of Defence, or as a result of some inspection by an authority higher than the unit in which the man is serving, a recommendation was sent to the Adjutant-General to reduce a particular N.C.O. That decision to reduce him may be taken without the knowledge of his Commanding Officer and these were the cases I had mainly in mind when I put down the amendment. I do not want to be taken as saying that the Commanding Officers are all at fault. The Minister said that in the case of a battalion the company commander would recommend to the Commanding Officer and the matter would then go up to the hierarchy of command, but under the regulations the Minister now has, the Adjutant-General may reduce an N.C.O. to a lower rank or to the ranks. It can come over to him as a result of a board or court of inquiry that a particular sergeant is to be reduced. I think it is unfair and everyone with a sense of justice will agree that it is unfair.
Surely, if a board of inquiry makes a recommendation of that kind, you will have to admit that it must be made——
Do not take me as admitting that it is on any recommendation of the board of inquiry. What happens is that a board of inquiry sits say, in the Curragh. The report of that court of inquiry goes through the different department in G.H.Q. and having gone through different departments a decision is taken by somebody there. I cannot place the particular individual but I know of a reduction as a result of a court of inquiry where the court of inquiry had made no recommendation. I can give another case—the case of a court-martial at which a sergeant is a witness and gives evidence and on the strength of that is reduced, although he is not a defendant before it. The records are read and he is given no opportunity of making his case against his reduction. I do not care what machinery the Minister may be advised would be best but I strongly recommend to the Minister that a man should have an opportunity of submitting his reasons as to why he should not be reduced, if he is being reduced by order of the Adjutant-General.
A court martial may reduce a man as a punishment. It is a serious punishment to be reduced to a lower rank by court-martial. I know that it is not abused. I accept what the Minister says, that it is not abused but it is to prevent the possibility of its being abused that I want to put in some protecting clause of this kind.
Captain Cowan has suggested, to my mind at any rate, that the reduction could take place as a result of some inquiry carried out, the information being passed into the civil side of the Department of Defence and, as a result, the N.C.O. is reduced by someone.
Do not mind the civil side. It goes through the military side also.
The "someone", I presume, is some civil official ?
No, some officer.
The only one that can do it is the Adjutant-General. If a board of inquiry made any such recommendation, the Adjutant-General would receive it and, as it had not emanated from a Commanding Officer, he would immediately communicate with that officer and get all the information that could be secured about the N.C.O. whose reduction was recommended. He would not in any circumstances act without that information. If, as a result of his inquiries, he was not prepared to accept the recommendation which he had already received, he certainly would come to the Minister. I am certain that that is one of the cases in which he would immediately approach the Minister and discuss the whole matter with him, probably from the point of view of resisting the recommendation.
I do not want the Minister to be under any misapprehension about the side that would do it. I certainly would say that the military sections of the Department of Defence would strongly resist and resent a recommendation coming from the civil side that a particular N.C.O. would be reduced. I would have no doubt about that. I can give you a case in point. A court of inquiry is held into a matter of stores. That court of inquiry is set up by the Quartermaster-General and comes to the Quartermaster-General. He reads the proceedings—when I say he reads, I mean the staff reads the proceedings. Some officer there, having read them, may say that a particular quartermaster-sergeant is completely and absolutely incompetent ; he did not carry out such-and-such a regulation. The Quartermaster-General sends over a recomendation that the particular company quartermaster-sergeant should be reduced. When I say the Quartermaster-General or the quartermaster-sergeant, it has no relation to any living person or any present occupant of the post.
I have also seen the case where proceedings of a court-martial come up. One of the persons who reads them is the officer in charge of administration in the Adjutant-General's Department. He goes through them with a fine comb to know who has been at fault. He may find what appears on the face of it to be very gross misconduct or neglect on the part of an N.C.O. and he can recommend that that man be reduced. That can happen. These are incidents that occur miles away from the unit, with no intervening authority and, under the regulations, the Adjutant-General can decide. If the Adjutant-General were to give that N.C.O. a note in writing saying that as a result of his negligence he has decided that, unless he makes a case to the contrary, he is unfit to be an N.C.O. and that he proposes to reduce him, I do not see that there would be anything wrong in that. I do not think there would be anything wrong in letting him make his case. The record may be wrong.
I am wondering if it would meet your idea if there were some machinery brought into the Act by the Minister which would enable the N.C.O.'s side of the case to go from his unit at the same time as the Commanding Officer's recommendation, as distinct from it coming back to the N.C.O. ?
I know of very few cases of a reduction being recommended by a man's Commanding Officer. I agree with what has been said by Deputy Collins and the Minister. The whole idea of the unit is to do the best they can for a fellow. A man may have deteriorated a bit. He may have rendered good service and that good service would be remembered and it is right to put him in a position where he will not do any damage. That is the human side.
Instead of its coming back from the Adjutant-General at a stage where deliberation may have taken place, would it be possible that when there is a recommendation going up that there should be reduction in rank, that the man's side of the story would go up at the same time giving reasons why he should not be reduced ?
That takes it as starting in a particular way. It can start at the top. I do not care what machinery is provided so long as the man has an opportunity before being reduced in making his case against the reduction.
He has that opportunity at the stage where his Commanding Officer tells him that he is going to make the recommendation. He can go to his superior officer and state the case against the recommendation, if he so desires, and the superior officer may see good reason why the recommendation should not be forwarded to the Adjutant-General. I think that is as much as anyone can ask.
I have sympathy with Deputy Cowan's point. Suppose something emanates from the Quartermaster General's office to the Adjutant-General. There is less chance of the N.C.O. making a case when that has arisen. It seldom comes from the unit but if it is coming in the way instanced by Deputy Cowan, as a result of G.H.Q. inspection of a unit, when certain recommendations are made from outside the unit, it is not as easy to find where it came from or how it emanated. In the case of officers, my recollection is that if an adverse report is made against an officer, he has to sign it that he has seen it. That gives me a good deal of sympathy with the idea, while I understand fully the Minister's point of view and sympathise completely with it. In the normal way a Commanding Officer who has an N.C.O. who is deteriorating in quality is human and fatherly and tries to help him.
The situation could arise in another way. A man may not even be fully apprised of what has caused his reduction, if some kind of outside body inspects. I do not think it would in any way weaken the Minister's hand or the Bill if some machinrey were devised between this and Report Stage whereby an N.C.O, at some stage would be told that a recommendation for his reduction was being made and informed that, if he had any cause to show why that recommendation should not go through, to make the case and that it would be forwarded.
I am in sympathy with the view expressed by Deputy Collins.
So am I.
It seems reasonable that a man should get some opportunity before the reduction takes place.
The Minister has just stated that that man has the opportunity in the earlier stages of going to his superior officer. What I would like to know is would the superior officer be senior to his own Commanding Officer ?
No. He can only go to his own Commanding Officer. Let us make no mistake about that. The only officer he can go to is his Commanding Officer and he cannot go above that.
The company officer who makes the recommendation is not the superior officer to whom I referred. The officer to whom I referred would be the battalion commander.
Could he go to him ?
Of course.
I would say that the recommendation would come from the battalion commander. When it comes to a matter of that sort, it is his Commanding Officer that will deal with it. He can only go to his Commanding Officer and the recommendation will actually be made by his Commanding Officer, if it is one that starts below. The recommendation that his company commander would make would be an informal kind of one. The company commander would make an informal report and the Commanding Officer can see for himself-what the situation is. In effect, the situation is that there is one officer who decides—if it is initiated below—that is, the Commanding Officer, and the N.C.O. has no appeal over that Commanding Officer. That is the trouble.
In some of the cases cited by Deputy Cowan he referred to the recommendation for a reduction in a man's rank as a result of information coming before some of the senior officers as a result of courts of inquiry. It appears to me that such a recommendation would be made on the sworn testimony of the man himself, admitting certain non-compliance with the regulations, perhaps. That is what I gathered by the statement made by Deputy Cowan.
In a court of inquiry—it is not a trial of that man—it is a taking of evidence generally without reference to the rules of evidence that would apply if it was a personal charge against that man. On that evidence somebody will make a recommendation for his reduction. Common justice seems to demand at that stage that the man would have some opportunity of appeal. Let me take the analogy with the civil court. If a man is convicted in any court, whether the District Court or the Central Criminal Court, he has the right of appeal. It is the principle now that we are discussing, not the actual wording of the amendment. I feel that there should be some method of appeal open to that man in that case where he could say : "I am going to be reduced, apparently for this reason ; I have not had an opportunity of putting up this case for myself and I should have the opportunity."
Perhaps the Minister would consider something that would meet a case the Minister has not adverted to. I would point out one where a court of inquiry dealing with general stores of a battalion did not name anyone but said the company quartermaster-sergeant in charge of " X " store and a certain corporal in charge of another store could not be competent—as a result of which certain recommendations were made. It might well be that, if those matters had been investigated specifically in the form of a charge, what might have appeared in the general picture to be the culpability of an N.C.O. might not have proved so, in fact—as did subsequently arise out of this case where the matter came up in the form of a court-martial
I have a specific case for which I could give the Minister chapter and verse. I am not going to put these as the facts, but I am giving this as illustrative. I had under my control at one time a private soldier who was an excellent man. He was gradually promoted and ultimately, on my recommendation, reached the rank of company sergeant. I found out very early on that he had once previously been a sergeant and had been reduced. I had known him from 1934 to 1944, as a private, an N.C.O. and an officer. I was in the same billet—he was a regular—and you could not ask for a better man. From my own intimate experience of him, I would give him a very high recommendation and never once was there the slightest reason for distrust. He proved himself trustworthy in every rank he held up to his discharge. I asked him what had happened in the past that he was demoted and he told me that he had " taken the rap " for somebody else, for an officer. There was another officer who was involved in that matter and I spoke to that other officer, who made charges to me about that man that I subsequently found to be unfounded. He had reported them to me hearsay. I never pursued the matter, so I cannot say that what happened in the first instance was a miscarriage. I go so far as to say that that man was in a position where he could not have avoided it, as he had no right of appeal and the circumstances were very like the hypothetical case Deputy Cowan has put. I would not press the Minister to take the form of words in the amendment, but I think that where a man is going to be reduced—and, as Deputy Cowan says, it is a very serious punishment—he should have some protection. It is a most horrible punishment, not only financially but in loss of social status.
And it may put him under someone else.
It is a very serious matter. The Minister would be wise to reconsider this. That is as much as I would ask, as I know it is difficult.
I would like to support the Cathaoirleach on that, from actual experience.
From actual experience ?
Yes.
No one is entitled to be present at the court of enquiry except those giving evidence or those against whom some charge is made or whose military status may be affected. Evidence may be given against a particular individual in the course of that inquiry : he is not there and has no opportunity to cross-examine or say a word. On the strength of that, I have seen recommendations come from high authority to the Adjutant-General to reduce a man. Understanding that, I think Deputy Hilliard can see that the recommendation can be made although the man may have no opportunity of countering on the spot.
Even remembering the authority would be used most prudently and with the greatest desire to be fair, a lot of the cases arise where someone superior to the N.C.O. is on the spot, unless that N.C.O. can be made carry the baby. There is no use blinking the fact that that can happen. If the system is such that that is put to higher authority and they decide on that, while I know the higher authorities in the Department are most careful, nevertheless the machinery would be such that there is no opportunity of getting the true facts.
I have no personal experience of this. I look upon it as simple justice that a man who may be going to suffer loss should get an opportunity of stating his side of the case.
The weight of opinion seems to be in favour of having this re-examined. I will have that done.
When I was drafting the amendment I considered putting in "the Minister" instead of " Adjutant-General ". If the Minister so wishes, that can be done.
I am satisfied that the Adjutant-General will do the work as efficiently.
The Committee is practically unanimous on this, so the Minister will reconsider it.
