CHAPTER V

THE CIVIL SERVICE

Laymen and Experts
A Non-Partisan Service
Civil Service Recruitment
Conditions of Work
Influence of the Civil Service
Government by Experts
Expense
Conclusion

LAYMEN AND EXPERTS.

The last chapter ended with a plea that politicians should
recognise the technical difficulties of their task and train them-
selves accordingly. The reader may object that there are already
trained experts, in the Gvil Service. Is not the politician meant
to represent the intelligent layman? He has not the detailed
knowledge of the expert; but neither does he run the risk, as
experts in one Department do, of becoming absorbed in that
Department and losing his sense of proportion. For some time
it has been the theory of British Government, that each Depart-
ment should hav$ a lay chief with expert subordinates—the
expert advises, but the layman has the last word. There are
parallels to this in other spheres of public life: in criminal trials,
lawyers will state a case, the judge will explain the questions at
issue, but twelve laymen will decide the verdict. This system
has been satirised, as in W, S* Gilbert's picture of the First Lord
of the Admiralty who had never been to sea, and in the story of
the Chancellor of the Exchequer being instructed in the mysteries
of decimal points. On the other side, the expert, acting always
according to rule, has also been satirised, and some of the most

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