Book Reviews
| Date | 01 December 1952 |
| Published date | 01 December 1952 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9299.1952.tb02809.x |
BOOK
REVIEWS
The Local Government Service
By
J.
H.
WARREN. The New
Town
and County
Hall
Series (Allen
&
UnWin)
(1952).
_-
Pp. xiv and 222. 18s.
FEW
men could write of the Local Govern-
ment Service with greater authority
than
Mr.
Warren. He
has
more
than
35
years’
experience of that service, having first
risen to be
Town
Clerk of Slough, and
then become
General
Secretary of
N.A.L.G.O., a position which he holds
today. One
is
therefore entitled to look
to
him
for an authoritative description of
the development of the service and tbe
evolution
of
the present organisation of
Local Government O5cers.
In
this
book
he
performs
the task most efficiently.
At the beginning of this
century
each
local authority employed such officers as it
saw
fit,
and paid them such salaries as it
chose. Professional associations were
already doing much for the senior
officers,
but
no
organisation existed to protect the
interests of those without professional
qualifications. There was, as a result of
this,
much nepotism and inefficiency. At
the same time there were many able men
in the
service
of local
councils,
and pro-
motion was open to any
man
of talent.
There were, without
a
doubt, some men
of very great ability among the
Town
Clerks and Chief officers of tbe
nine-
teenth and early twentieth centuries.
Since
then the standard and the
lot
of
the junior and middle ranks have been
greatly improved.
This
is primarily due
to the National Association of
Local
Government officers, which was founded
in
1905 as a general trade
union
for
all
those who are generally included within
the description of
Local
Government
officers.
Slowly
this
association
won
support from the employees of local
authorities, and recognition from the
authorities themselves. whitleyism was
established, at first
on
the basis
of
regional
councils,
and finally,
in
1946, a scheme of
salaries and conditions of
service
for
all
officers throughout
the
country
was
achieved. Side by side with
this
there was
evolved a national system of examinations
both for entry into the service and for
promotion within it.
This
development is described by
Mr.
Warren with considerable skill. He
takea
an obvious, and
justifled,
pride in the
achievements of N.A.L.G.O.
in
building
up a national
service
out of the scattered
and unorganised elements of
half
a
century
ago. At the same time he
is
critical of the
way in which the system of entrance and
promofion examinations
has
developed.
In
particular he disapproves of the early
policy of allowing
no
intermediate pro-
fessional qualifications
to
count as an
equivalent or alternative
to
tpe promotion
examination. That
policy
has, however,
now been abandoned, and
Mr.
Warren
appears to be
in
full agreement
with
the
new
system
which
is
now being introduced.
The outstanding feature of
this
new
system is the institution of a
final
examina-
tion whicfi,
it
is proposed, should be
regarded as conferring
an
administrative
qualification equivalent in status and
standard to that of the major professional
qualifications, and to be of
no
lower
standard
than
a
university pass degree.
This,
It
is
suggested, may or may not
open the way for men who are not qualified
members of a profession to reach the
highest appointments
in
Local
Govem-
ment.
Mr.
Warren seems to doubt
whether
it
will
in fact have such
an
effect.
He
is
naturally interested in the problem
of improving the standard and
status
of
Local
Government
officers.
For
this
purpose he puts his faith in post-enuy
training.
That
is to
say,
he does not
believe
in
a general policy of attempting
to recruit into the service men with
university degrees, but in the alternative
policy of-enabling those who are already
in
the service to improve themselves by
studying in their
spare
time and
in
such
time
as
may
be allowed
to
them by their
employing authorities. “The
Local
Government
Service
is not likely to follow
the
Civil
Service model in establishing a
segFegated higher administrative
class
by
direct recruitment from the universities.
On
the other hand,
it
is safe to say that
if
the basic qualification remains pre-
dominantly the professional one, both
the
sentiment of the
sraffs
and- their employers
will
create an impeZus towards the pro-
vision
of the fullest facilities for acquiring
professional qualifications by post-entry
study. Questions of supply apart, post-
entry study at all levels must be tbe
main
resource of the Service
in
responding to
the
call
for
efficiency
in
changing
tasks
379
PUBLIC
ADMINISTRATION
and conditions.
It
will
be
a line of ad-
vance much in keeping with Service
effort
in
the past, and much
in
keeping
with current trends
in
every sphere. If
the “liberal education” in the older
tradition
still
has its incomparable values,
it
is
no
longer regarded as a universal
and immediate passport to the upper
levels of responsibility and mntrol. We
may be moving to some
new
form
of an
old conception-work and
training
in
combination. It
has,
in
all
ages and
societies, been a
fruitful
one in the growth
and advance of human
skills.”
This
means that the writer believes that
the way to get better
Local
Government
officers
is not to
seek
for the best from
the universities, but to give the existing
ofIicers and their successors more en-
couragement and oppomdty to study
in their spare time. Such an opinion is
naturally acceptable to the greater part of
the present
staffs,
but is not necessarily
a complete answer to the problem. Today
the opportunities for the ablest young men
and women of England to get
to
a univer-
sity,
irrespective of their poverty or
wealth, are greatly increased. The boy
who
has
distinguished
himself
at a Gram-
mar School might formerly have gone
on
to
work at the
Town
Hall.
Today he
is
more likely to find
his
way to a university.
The
Local
Authorities of England are
spending great
sums
of
money every year
to make this possible for the children of
even the poorest parents. At the same
be, and partly
as
a result of
this,
those
who go straight to work in the
Town
Hall
are, as
Mr.
Warren admits, generally
of
a
lower calibre than their predecessors.
But yet the policy advocated
in
this
book
entails, with some exceptions, the re-
jection of the abler men and women from
the universities,
in
favour of the existing
staffs,
with additional qualifications ob-
tained by spare time study.
It
is
difficult
to
believe that
such
a policy
can
in
the
long
run
be for the benefit of English
Local
Government.
The prime purpose of
this
book,
how-
ever,
is
not to
justify
a
policy,
but to
describe the
Local
Government Service,
and the
circumstances
in
which
it
has
grown.
In
this
it is unmistakeably
successful.
It
is
a sound and mmpre-
hensible account
of
the subject, and a
most useful addition to the
scanty
litera-
ture
on
this
theme. It
is
well worthy of a
place in the New
Town
and
County
Hall
Series.
B.
KJXITH-LUCAS.
Autonomy and Delegation in County Government
:
A study
of
Delegation in Education and Local
Health
Administration
By E~WJ~INR
W.
COHEN.
Institute of Public Administration,
1952.
Pp.
ix
+181.
6s.
THE
Education
AK, 1944
and the National
Health Service Act,
1946
concentrated
power in the County
Councils
in
order
to
secure a much needed
uniformity
in
the
standaqd of service available. Both Acts
suggested delegation to subordinate bodies
so
as to secure the association of
local
representatives
in
the working of the
services
in
accordance with democratic
principles. Although, as Professor Robson
indicates
in
his
Foreword,
this
was but an
ingenious device in substitution for the
long overdue reform of
local
government, it
deserves study and
Miss
Cohen’s book
shows how delegation has been carried out.
Considerably more guidance was given
by the
Ministry
of
Education than by the
Ministry
of Health and undoubtedly the
Divisional Executives were intended to
exercise greater power than the Sub-Com-
mittees but,
in
both
cases, planning,
policy and finance were to remain county
matters.
380
In the course of her researches, the
author found little basic
similarity
between
county Health schemes and obtained
a
general impression that the Sub-Com-
mittees play
no
vital part
in
administration,
though some
rural
areas appear
to
have
gained from decentralisation. In Education,
to which the
greater
part of her book is
devoted, she discovered
that,
although the
schemes of divisional administration looked
very much alike
on
paper, they varied
considerably
in
fact.
On
the whole, she
believes that
in
neither
service
has
sufficient
thought been given to the kind of
function
which
ought to be delegated and that
this
needs to be done
if
local participation is
to be reaIly effective. The interpretation
of the term
“
delegation
”
needs clear
thought and
Miss
&hen undoubtedly
feels that county authorities probably find
it
easier to treat divisional executives as
agents rather
than
as responsible bodies.
Where, as
in
some counties, directors
To continue reading
Request your trial