ABSTRACT
Soon after 1830, when individual responsibility and central financial control were established as main planks in the management of the navy, dockyard workers were classified for employment and payment according to their ability. This chapter examines the contest over classification in the 1830s in isolation, perhaps as the naval counterpart to the protest against the New Poor Law. Classification was the product of the necessity to fill that void in incentives left by the abolition of perquisites in 1796-1801. After 1800 the relatively small amount of money available from fee funds, from the sale of old stores and from contingencies, combined with the necessity for applicants to be surveyed, deterred potential applicants for pensions. The elderly thus continued to be retained in naval bureaucracy, while the younger, more efficient and ambitious men continued to wait to succeed them. From 1822, by Act of parliament, deductions were made from salaries to pay for later pensions and committed to a pension fund.
