1698
Objects and Reasons.
1. This Ordinance repeals the Deportation Ordinances of 1917, 1929 and 1931 and replaces them by an Ordinance which consolidates with certain amendments those of their provisions which related to the deportation of Aliens.
2. A Table of Correspondence is attached which sets out in detail the variations between the new Ordinance and the Ordinances it replaces.
3. The principal new provisions are:
(1) Deportation Orders under this Ordinance will only be made against undesirables who are found by the Governor in Council to be aliens. This involves slight changes in the long and short titles, the disappearance of section 4 of Ordinance No. 25 of 1917, as enacted by Ordinance No. 7 of 1931, and of the special form of Deportation Order applicable to British subjects with consequential omissions in the sections now re- enacted as sections 2, 12, 16 (5) and 18.
(2) In section 2 an alien is defined as a person who is not a British subject, a definition which has been taken from section 27 (1) of the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act, 1914. A further provision in section 2 defines a British subject as a person of British nationality. This new definition though short is comprehensive. It replaces the provision in Ordinance No. 25 of 1917, which defined a British subject as including a natural-born British subject and a person naturaliz- ed under an Imperial Act or under an Ordinance of the Colony. That definition is considered unsatisfactory because it appeared to throw doubt on the status of the wives of British subjects or aliens, whose nationality is determined by section 10 of the British Nationality and Status of Aliens Act, 1914 (4 & 5 Geo. 5, c. 17) as enacted by the Act of 1933 (23 & 24 Geo. 5, s. 49), and because it apparently included former British subjects who had lost their British nationality.
(3) Section 9, which replaces section 5 of the 1917 Ordinance has been revised so as to give the Inspector General of Police a discretion to release from custody persons on whom deportation orders have been served and an addition has been made to section 11 (a) (which replaces section 6 (a) of the 1917 Ordinance). These two amendments were approved by the Secretary of State in a despatch of the 9th April, 1934.
(4) Section 15 (which replaces section 11 of the 1917 Ordinance) has been revised to include other prisons besides Victoria Gaol.
(5) An eighth question has been added to form No. 2 in the Schedule, asking if the person concerned is willing to be questioned about the matter, and a new sub-section 4 (5) relating thereto has been added. This seems necessary in order to enable the person to give a full statement, if he so desires, the Full Court having held in the Sung Man Cho case, that section 3A (4) enacted in Ordinance No. 7 of 1931 (now replaced by section 4 (4) of the new Ordinance) only authorised supplementary questions confined to the particulars in the statutory questions or allegations and did not authorise the taking of a full statement.
April, 1935.
C. G. ALABASTER,
Attorney General.