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Chapter 806 Extra: Change (I)

The Ministry of Personnel underwent a major reshuffle from top to bottom, and officials from other places were transferred to the capital one after another.

Before they could arrive at the Wang residence with their visiting cards, Minister Wang called everyone to a meeting.

Prime Minister Chen was also the Minister of Personnel, and all personnel changes in the Ministry of Personnel were finalized by Prime Minister Chen. Naturally, Prime Minister Chen had to attend this important meeting.

Prime Minister Chen said few words, but his words were concise and to the point: "You are all officials who have been rated as excellent for five consecutive years, and that is why you have been transferred to the Ministry of Personnel to serve."

"The Emperor is working hard to govern the country and has high expectations for the Ministry of Personnel. You are the ones who are receiving his salary, so you should share his worries."

A group of officials from the Ministry of Personnel trembled with fear and bowed their hands in response in unison.

Most of them were former officials of the Prime Minister's Party. However, Prime Minister Wang had resigned several years ago, and the young Minister Wang was a well-known loyal minister, loyal to Her Majesty the Empress. The term "Prime Minister's Party" had not been mentioned for a long time.

Her Majesty the Empress was not picky about personnel, and she transferred people from various prefectures and counties in Daliang to the Ministry of Personnel in the capital in order to reform the corruption and rectify the administration of officials. They will be the sharp blades in the hands of Her Majesty the Empress in the future. I really don't know whether it is the good deeds of their ancestors or bad luck that they were chosen in this way.

Now that you are here, there is no way to hide. You can only bite the bullet and do your job!

After Prime Minister Chen's words, Minister Wang took out a few pages of paper and read out the new policy of the Ministry of Personnel in a leisurely manner.

All the officials from the Ministry of Personnel straightened their backs in unison and listened attentively.

Prime Minister Chen saw this and felt secretly satisfied.

Her Majesty made a brilliant move by letting Wang Jin take charge of the Ministry of Personnel. The Prime Minister's Party officials were everywhere in the court. If you want to completely remove them, firstly, it would be a huge effort and no one would be available. Secondly, the court and the people would be uneasy due to the turmoil. Kill one group, suppress another group, and then promote another group, slowly divide them, and use them for your own benefit. This is the mature method of the emperor.

The process is slow, don't rush. Her Majesty is still young and can sit on the throne for decades, so take it step by step.

The new policy of the Ministry of Personnel that Minister Wang spent several months coming up with was presented to the Emperor for review before it was read out. With the Emperor's approval, it was brought out today.

The most important ones are the reform of the official evaluation program and the change of the official appointment mechanism.

The assessment plan is strict and detailed, with dozens of items listed, each with a corresponding score.

The assessment will be changed from once a year to four times a year, that is, once every three months. Those who fail four times in a row will be dismissed directly.

The official appointment and promotion system is also different from the past. There is also a detailed assessment and scoring system.

The dense and complicated regulations make people dizzy.

Thinking of the complicated tasks they would have to deal with next, the officials in the Ministry of Personnel all felt a chill in their hearts, but they did not dare to show it on their faces and responded in a low voice.

The Ministry of Personnel was undergoing reforms, and the other five government departments were also innovating.

Take the Ministry of Rites for example. The most important duties of the Ministry of Rites are to manage sacrificial rituals and imperial examinations. The first two are related to the dignity of the court, and the latter is to select talents for the country. All officials in the Daliang officialdom are basically selected through imperial examinations, and there is a set of imperial examination system that has lasted for hundreds of years. Her Majesty summoned Minister Dong alone and raised several doubts and suggestions for improvement on the current imperial examination system.

Dong Shangshu was only slightly inferior to Chen Chengxiang in understanding the emperor's mind and guessing his intentions. After listening to the emperor's words, Dong Shangshu pondered all night, and wrote a thick memorial until his hair turned gray.

In his memorial, Dong Shangshu made a profound analysis of the imperial examination system, believing that the current system was a bit outdated and that the selection of officials was entirely based on classics, history, philosophy, and policy essays, which was too simplistic. After all, in the Liang Dynasty, those who could afford to read and repeatedly take the imperial examinations were mostly children of scholarly families or wealthy families.

This made the imperial examination a privilege for the aristocratic families. There were very few children from ordinary families who could endure the hard work of studying and become a Jinshi.

Therefore, all prefectures and counties in Daliang should set up schools with free tuition so that children of appropriate age can go to school for their elementary education.

Nanyang School has been opened for several years and has gradually shown results. However, it is a school for girls and is too small. Next, we need to expand the school and try our best to let more children learn to read and write, so as to enlighten the people.

In addition, Daliang Prefecture needs all kinds of talents. For example, those who are good at farming, those who are good at raising horses, those who are good at iron smelting and forging, etc. The court should set up a corresponding examination mechanism to select the top talents in all walks of life, give them official positions, let them receive court salaries, and let them work for the court.

This memorial was read out at the grand court meeting, shocking all officials.

The reform of the Ministry of Personnel was not so urgent, and officials could just adapt and adjust slowly. However, the reform of the Ministry of Rites in the imperial examination was imminent, which made officials uneasy.

To put it more bluntly, the Daliang bureaucracy has existed for two hundred years. The aristocratic families are the real beneficiaries. They use their family's financial resources to support many scholars, pave the way for them to run for office, and when their children and grandchildren have a promising future, they will give back to the family. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. This is an inevitable phenomenon.

And now, Her Majesty, who has sat firmly on the throne for five years, is going to overturn the chessboard and make a new rule.

They and their families will be the first to suffer a huge impact.

This time, there was no need to add fuel to the fire. Many officials stepped forward and refuted Minister Dong in a righteous manner.

Minister Dong was well prepared and refuted each of the arguments sharply.

Standing next to Prime Minister Dong were Yang Shangshu, Ding Shangshu, and Prime Minister Chen. The thin-haired Minister Ji was unable to get a word in, nor did he intend to speak. He put his hands into his sleeves, silently thinking about submitting another resignation memorial.

In the past two years, Minister Ji submitted a petition to resign every few months. However, the emperor refused and tried to persuade him to stay. Minister Ji, whose stance and will were not firm, stayed on again and again until Minister Zhang fell, and he still stayed in the court.

The reform of the imperial examination system had little impact on the military officers, who were content to watch the civil officials, who were disregarding their decorum and causing a commotion.

Her Majesty, who was sitting on the dragon throne, did not rush to express her opinion. She just watched the ministers arguing and quarreling with cold eyes. Then she glanced at Lu Zhen.

Lu Zhen nodded slightly, took a step forward, and said loudly: "Everyone shut up and don't make any noise at the court meeting."

Her Majesty is so powerful that all the ministers are in awe of her. Even if they are not convinced, they keep silent.

The court fell silent.

The emperor stood up from the dragon chair and said: "I have read the memorial of Minister Dong before and agreed to it. I read it out at the court today so that all the ministers will know about it. It would be best if you agree, but it is useless to oppose. I have decided to implement the new policy starting from this year's imperial examination."