SIR,
29
Colonial Office to the Treasury.
DOWNING STREET.
18th August, 1880.
I am directed by the Earl of KIMBERLEY to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 30th July, stating that the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury think that it would be unadvisable at the present moment to sanction the Ordinance which it is proposed to pass in the Straits Settlements for the purpose of legalizing the establishment at Singapore and hereafter, if desirable, in the other Settlements, of a branch of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank.
2. Four days after the receipt of your letter, the following telegram was received from the Governor of the Straits Settlements :-"Your telegram 4th May "Bank greatly hampered by delay of Bill."
3. In view of this telegram, Lord KIMBERLEY is disposed to think that there is some inconvenience in withdrawing for an indefinite time the permission sought by the Bank to enable the Branch at Singapore to be opened, to which the Local Government offer no objection. Without, however pressing this view further on the attention of their Lordships, Lord KIMBERLEY would suggest whether it might not be possible to grant the permission to the Bank, intimating at the same time that it has not been found possible to settle this sooner, as it appeared to Her Majesty's Government desirable that, before this permission was granted, the question of the continued issue of One Dollar Notes by the Bank, a measure to which the Government strongly objected, and only assented to as a temporary one, should be finally decided.
4. The Governor might be further desired to inform the Directors that Her Majesty's Government has settled in principle that this privilege should be terminated, but as some time will probably elapse before the measures consequent on such withdrawal can be matured, they are unwilling that the Bank should continue to suffer the inconvenience which the telegram shows it is labouring under from the delay to grant permission to open the Branch at Singapore.
5. The Branch at Singapore might then be sanctioned on the clear under- standing that so soon as Her Majesty's Government find it convenient tɔ do so, and on giving due notice, the permission to issue One Dollar Notes at Hongkong will be withdrawn.
6. If the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury are disposed to concur in the course now suggested, they may also perhaps consider whether at the same time, hopes might be held out to the Directors of meeting their views regarding the
specie reserve.
I am, &c.,
R. H. MEADE.
The Secretary of the Treasury.