Administratorship
pp. 16-17 · Read in the full issue
No Trained Territories Man Need Expect a Minor Administratorship
BY appointing a military official to
take charge of Norfolk Island, the Australian Government has con tinued the indefensible and deplorable system of rewarding its own nominees with the “cushy jobs” represented by the minor Pacific Administratorships, and ignoring the trained Territories men whose long and distinguished service should be rewarded with such
appointments.
Australia has two senior (Papua- New Guinea and Northern Territory) and two minor (Nauru and Norfolk Island) Administratorships within its gift. The two latter are easy jobs.
Nauru and Norfolk Island each has only a few hundred residents and only a few thousand acres; but the Admin istrator is called “His Honour”; has a comfortable salary, substantial allowances and a residency; and even if he devotes himself enthusiastically to his job, he need develop no ulcers from worry and overwork.
The two sinecures (five years Norfolk Island or Nauru) should g as a matter of course, to the ou standing men of the Papua-Ne Guinea public service, who give tl best years of their lives to the toug thankless job of tropical administr tion and who otherwise have nothir at all to look forward to except retir ment on what is, in these inflationai days, a very modest pension.
But Government after Governmer Red and anti-Red, for at least 7 years, has selected for these pleasai jobs either some out-of-work politicfi who is seeking a “billet,” or military man who has sheathed h sword and is wondering how to mat a living. They rarely, if ever, ha had any experience of Territory administration; but that does m matter —the job is so easy that almo anyone can fill it. Which is all tf more reason why it should not go t politicians’ favourites, and why
iould go, as a sort of well-paid >liday and a reward, to the out mding men who have borne the at and burden of Papua-New uinea administration.
The same brush which tarred friend Idie Ward, who sent Adelaide ades Hall leader Tom Richards to e Nauru Residency, appears to ve also tarred Territories Minister Isluck, A new appointment to luru is about to be announced. It 11 be interesting to see what Mr. isluck makes of that.
This NI appointment is a bitter appointment. Some had expected nething new of Mr. Paul Hasluck. t he has merely carried on a system it is in itself completely bad, and lich is a gross reflection upon the libre and status of the men who ry on the P-NG administration. . . is all in pattern with the complete creditation of Australia’s Menzies dden Government.