53. No loss or violation of air mails for which the Hong Kong Post Office was responsible was recorded during the year.
CHINA MAILS
54. A total of no less than 407,141 bags of mail were exchanged with China during the year of which 383,141 were conveyed by means of the Kowloon-Canton Railway. This represents an increase of 170,000 bags over the previous year. An average over the year of approximately 1,000 bags were despatched daily to China.
55. The heavy traffic caused considerable difficulty in storage each day and the handling of postings at various post offices, but it is to the credit of the staff and measures taken that the work was carried out without an undue adverse effect on normal postal facilities.
FORCES MAIL
56. Mails for Naval, Army and Air Force Units continued to be dealt with by the Fleet Mail Office and British Army Post Office in close liaison with this Department.
57. Mail arrangements for visiting foreign warships continued in liaison with their respective national postal administrations.
CHRISTMAS AND CHINESE NEW YEAR POSTINGS
58. Christmas postings were again heavy and showed a further increase over previous years, a total of over seven million items being handled in the ten days preceding Christmas Day.
59. The heaviest postings were on December 21st and 22nd, a total of over one million items being dealt with on each of these days.
60. Apart from the rush of local postings during the ten day period, over 29,000 bags of mail were handled and 32,139 parcels were delivered between 1st and 24th December.
61. To assist in clearing the heavy Christmas mails temporary labourers were employed in the Mails Branch for a period of two weeks.
62. The Chinese New Year period similarly produced its crop of records. A total of 1,499,366 items were machine-stamped during the nine day period as compared with 1,277,693 items in the previous year. Temporary labourers were employed for a period of one week as assistants to the regular uniformed staff.
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