236
HONG KONG ANNUAL REPORT
of callers at the Immigration Office in connexion with im- migration matters was approximately 400,000. Altogether 34,466 visas and 3,609 new British passports were issued.
KOWLOON AND TSUEN WAN RIOTS
On 19th August, 1957, the Report of the Riot Compensa- tion Advisory Board was published. This Board had been appointed by the Government to examine claims for com- pensation arising out of the 1956 Riots in Kowloon and Tsuen Wan. The Board reported that:
(i) in 610 cases (representing 676 individual applications) it recommended that ex gratia payments of various amounts should be made;
(ii) in 70 further cases it recommended that no payments
- should be made;
(iii) in 184 further cases, mainly from the Tsuen Wan area, it was unable to make any recommendation because the applicants had either neglected or refused to disclose the financial assistance received from other
sources and the Board had felt bound to assume that in a large number at least of these cases material financial assistance had in fact been received from
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other sources.
The Board also provided 'the Government with a schedule of amounts which it would have recommended for payment in these cases if disclosure had been made and if the amount
of financial assistance received from other sources had been negligible in relation to the degree of hardship which the Board felt it necessary to establish before it could make a firm recommendation for payment.
Simultaneously with the publication of the Board's Report, the Government issued a printed statement announcing that it had accepted the Board's first two recommendations and that as regards the third recommendation it had decided that for a number of reasons, explained in the statement, there