350 THE EXECUTIVE GOVERNMENT [parT 11 
can be retrenched, but only for bona fide retrenchment pur- 
poses, and they, if accused of important offences, must be 
tried by a board of inquiry, when they may be deprived of 
leave or fined by the departmental head, reduced in status by 
the Commissioner, or dismissed by the Governor-General in 
Council, according to the enormity of the offence. Moreover, 
they have civil claims for the salaries payable to them just 
as ordinary persons have against their employers, though in 
the Defence Department the rule is that no contract exists, 
but members can sue for sums due if deprived of office. On 
the other hand, the Government does not provide pensions, 
a serious error which is hardly made up for by the practice 
of requiring officers to insure their lives. But to compensate 
for this there is a minimum wage of £110 for officers over 
twenty-one years of age and a report on a pension scheme 
has been issued. 
As in the case of Canada, and in the case of all the states, 
the scheme is defective in not providing for any regular 
Civil Service which shall contain men of superior education : 
in the Commonwealth service the members of the clerical 
service are admitted by an elementary examination, and 
work up through the grades and subdivisions of the grades, 
in each of which a year at least must normally be spent. 
Thus for the posts of deputy heads, and so on, it is necessary 
to go outside the service and to choose men who are not 
trained civil servants! The result is that no Dominion 
contains such a Civil Service as that of England. 
In the states also the practice of leaving the Civil Service 
to the control of a local public service commission which is 
supreme over first appointments, and also over promotions 
and so forth, is in force. It is successful in its aim of securing 
that as a whole the service is free from political jobbery ; if, 
as is the case, there are from time to time disputes of some 
seriousness between the commission and the Government, 
as, for instance, in the case of the determination of the 
Government of the Commonwealth to make the post of 
* e.g. in the case of Mr. Atlee Hunt. deputy head of the Department of 
External Affairs