Civil Service Conditions

In Tonga

———♦——— Junior European Officers’ Poor Remuneration

From Our Tonga Correspondent.

Nukualofa, Nov. 10.

THE Civil Servants of the Tongan Government surely cannot be otherwise than envious of their contemporaries in the New Guinea service if they have perused your Canberra correspondent’s article in the September issue of The Pacific Islands Monthly.

In answer to their appeal and not withstanding the “straightened conditions of the finances,” Australia has sent them a Public Service Inspector to inquire into “the pay and allowances” and “make the public servants there as contented as possible.”

Lucky New Guinea! She has a worthy parent, whereas Tonga is just an orphan . . . .

I learn on good authority that the junior European public officers here have given up all hopes of ever getting their salaries reviewed and put on a basis commensurate with the services which they now, render, and have given in the past, to build up a generous surplus for the Tongan people.

And it seems that two very vital factors stand out against them. They are in the service of a native government naturally jealous of the attainments of the European, when contrasted with the native official; and they are at a distinct disadvantage in that there exists a three-cornered system of veto.

As regards the first factor, it is a natural corollary, when one remembers that the Missionaries inculcate the dogma that all men are equal in the sight of God, forgetting that they are not so in the sight of man. It is extremely doubtful if any Tongan native in the next fifty years will be produced with sufficient intelligent balance to grasp and thoroughly understand the higher mathematics. He is too care-free—this child of the sun— and his brain is, as yet, underdeveloped.

It is true that some of them have been made junior magistrates, and do fairly well with a European Chief Justice to keep them within bounds, but even the products of Newington and the local College have proven sad disappointments when “tried out” in the higher branches of the Civil Service.

And these very failures, in themselves, have made the native insensibly irritated when he finds that the European official quickly grasps and holds down his job.

The second factor then is the veto.

From information carefully gathered, the problem is insurmountable, and the junior European official (I use the word junior advisedly because the “heads” —mostly members of the Privy Council —are financially well-established) finds himself in a cleft stick. His application for increase in salary goes to Privy Council, and may get knocked on the head there. If it survives that stage, it has to receive the approval of the British Consul, and it some times gets a death sentence in that office. But even if it slides through that second tribunal it still has to go to the Legislative Assembly where the chances are roughly 19 to 3 against a successful issue.

The Third Tribunal

It is the Legislative Assembly which has gained for Tonga the unenviable reputation of being the island kingdom of “Comic Opera” Government. It is composed of 22 legislators, comprising the representatives of the Crown; the representatives of the nobles, and the representatives of the commoners.

These two latter groups (mostly uneducated in the business of Government) with the first, sit there in what seems a never-ending session; many of them asleep as “they know not what they do,” and do not care either as long as their subsistence allowance carries on. Yet, I must say this for them, they wake up and vote strongly when the Speaker calls for a division on the cocoa and banana question. Three men only in that Assembly are European, so it will be seen that the writer had no difficulting in assessing the odds against the European official.

Actually though, the Crown representatives (including the three Europeans) generally vote en masse, but their eight votes register a poor minority. It may be asked then how with the Crown always swamped, the Government gets any measure through at all. And this is the secret. After the “House” has mangled the draft estimates they go back to the Council and, in alleged collaboration with the British Consul, the Council picks out those items that it really wants and throws the balance into the laps of the representatives as a palliative to their injured feelings. In effect, the Council says to the “House”: “Reconsider numbers 2, 4 and 6, and we will meet you by cutting out 1, 3 and 5.”

The “House” is then fearfully “bucked” at the thought that it has really done something' in session, and promptly grants 2, 4 and 6, and nobody worries over the fact that tucked away

in the eliminated clauses was that junior official’s increase. He, poor chap, can only ponder over the fact that, by some coincidence, his increase is always amongst the discards.

Curiously enough, he cannot see the joke, either, being evidently devoid of the sense of humour.

Although I can get no definite statements from the junior officials them selves (they are astonishingly loyal), I have it on irrefutable authority that for the past decade most of their individual applications have been sanctioned by both Council and Consul only to receive the “axe” by the Legislative Assembly, and for no apparent reason, unless it is that the applicants are European.

Need For Civil Service

Association

If you will accept my advice, you European Civil Servants, you can do no better than form amongst yourselves a Civil Service Association —individually you will never get anywhere —but collectively you probably can. If, when you are properly constituted you get no redress within the confines of the little Kingdom, get your complaints (backed up with all the data you can collect) into the hands of the High Commissioner for the Western Pacific.

Whatever is said to the contrary, you are living in a semi-Crown colony, and I know that the High Commission has in the past righted many wrongs in connection with the administration of this same little Kingdom. It’s worth trying anyhow. ———