"Not very many years ago there was a clerk of whom perpetual complaints were made to me. He was in a hard-worked department, and the heads of it told me repeatedly: 'We can do nothing with him.' At last we got it arranged that he should go [with a large pension, on the theory that his office was abolished, because no longer required]. My back was turned--I was away on a holiday--and when I came back, I found that Parliamentary pressure, by which I mean applications from Members, had been put on, and in spite of us all, the man was back in the place to the detriment of our credit. Let me mention another case. I was engaged upon a reorganization of the department under one of the strongest men [Ministers] I have ever served. What the President of the Board of Trade said to me, in effect was: 'We must have new blood; we are getting crowded up with effete men; I will back you in anything you do, only you must undertake not to get me into a difficulty in the House of Commons. I cannot afford it; the Government cannot afford time for it; they cannot afford strength to fight battles of that kind.' We set to work about the reorganization with our hands tied, and we were obliged to say to these men: 'Well, if you stay here, we will make it very uncomfortable for you; we will put you in the very worst places in the office,' The Treasury offered good terms of retirement [pensions], and in that way, after a good deal of fighting, we got rid of most of them.... We had to give them very high terms [that is, very liberal pensions]. I may mention a case which happened even since then. I refer to the official Receivers in Bankruptcy. They were men who were appointed only a few years ago, under the most stringent conditions imposed by the Treasury and the Board of Trade, and without the slightest reference to personal considerations or to politics. They were told that they were appointed on trial, that they might be removed at any moment if the Board of Trade desired it for the good of the service. Fortunately, most of them have turned out extremely well. One, perhaps more, turned out bad, but one certainly turned out very bad. Perpetual complaints were made to me by the head of that department that he could do nothing with this man, and that the business was being badly conducted. After a good deal of trouble, after I left, it was determined to remove this man. The Members of Parliament for the county, as I am told, came and put pressure upon the President of the Board of Trade [the Minister], till he was obliged to say: 'I cannot remove him; he must stay.'" [Sidenote: _Pension System no Remedy_]