I’m with you most of the way on the need for honours reform (Editorial, 30 December). In fact, I’d like to see the system abolished completely, so long as the worst offender, the House of Lords, is included. Community honours are a good idea in themselves, but with a degree of arbitrariness that surely makes them susceptible to criticism for being unfair overall – wouldn’t it be better to have suitable recognition locally?
But while the centralised system remains with us, I have to object strongly to what you say about civil servants – to the extent that you include them in the group that gets gongs “simply because they have done their nine-to-five stint and kept their noses clean”. And since Whitehall and environs is the main source of “automatic” honours, my assumption seems fair.
I left the civil service in 1989 and never came across anyone who got a CB (Companion of the Order of the Bath) on this basis. Nobody who worked nine to five would ever have reached this level, and clean noses would have got them nowhere (though these days a less respectful ex-mandarin than me might think that a free supply of tissues in the workplace would be much appreciated in dealing with the odour created in Whitehall by Mr Cummings and his ilk).
While I admit it doesn’t sanctify the award, more than once during my time in Whitehall I heard more senior colleagues defend the system on the grounds that civil servants at their level “earned more than they were paid” in contrast to their private-sector equivalents, many of whom were claimed to be in a reverse situation. Having worked in both areas in my career, I think this is (or was in my time) broadly correct. When I was a civil servant, my final view on retirement was that Whitehall colleagues were on the whole of a higher quality both in terms of industry and competence than their “equals” elsewhere. But what this does suggest to me is that the “automatic” honours system, though not perfect, is intrinsically unobjectionable. After all, it’s hard to exchange a CB for cash, though I understand a knighthood is more serviceable.
But by all means let us get rid of this part of the system, and pay more to those who merit it. Over to you, prime minister, an apostle of justice and fairness throughout your career.
John Mallinson
Oxted, Surrey
• This letter was amended on 2 December 2020 because, due to an editing error, an earlier version referred to the honour of CBE (Commander of the Order of the British Empire) when CB (Companion of the Order of the Bath) was meant.
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