Who remembers the CES?

A couple of early experiences with the Commonwealth Employment Service.

There was an ad in my local CES office: Australia Post drivers were required. Now there was an idea, I thought. Curious about this I wanted to find out the salary. So, in nothing more than a casual enquiry of the desk clerk, “What does the job pay?” I was asked to fill in a form, and got no answer to my question. Several months later I received a letter from Australia Post asking me to attend a driving test. I still didn’t know the salary, but I was only half interested in the job. So, I went along for fun. I failed the driving test as it happened, and no one ever told me what the salary was. My goof on the driving test resulted because I failed to obey a street sign. My examiner directed my to pull over to the side of the road. I thought he was checking to see if I could stop without hitting the kerb, but I failed to notice that that section of the road had a no standing sign displayed. I missed that. I was just following his direction. Of course, van drivers will never stop at no standing areas of the road. Oh no, that just doesn’t happen in real life. What a joke.

I had heard that Simpson & Pope was hiring staff at one of their factories. I called at the factory employment office and was advised that the local CES was managing the recruitment. So, I called into the nearby CES office, and after the long wait in the queue was asked, “Are you registered here?” Well no, I wasn’t registered at that office as it happened. I was listed with another suburban office. “You’ll have to go to the office where you’re registered,” the clerk said. So, I drove across town to my own office. Another wait in another queue to hear, “Sorry, we don’t handle Simpson & Pope.” So, I drove back exactly to where I was an hour earlier, and joined the queue once more. This time I was faced with another clerk at the desk, and I was ready to unload my frustration at being given a bum steer, but instead he just gave me a slip to take to the factory employment office, and I had a job.

Of course the CES doesn’t exist anymore. That was quite a time ago. Now we have Centrelink. Shortly after I finished my degree I got a phone call out of the blue. It was someone from the Professional Employment Service, a branch of the CES as it happened. I had no idea such a branch of the CES existed. Well blow me down. I don’t ever recall registering with them, and here they are asking if they can be of assistance. It was really nice to be fawned over. It was like I had a personal assistant who was going to help me get work. I was quite flattered really. I got my own job as it happened, but it did leave me with a very favourable impression. On the other hand, I don’t really have anything favourable to say about Centrelink. I expect others might be able relate to that.