229
The Council then resumed in order to adjourn its proceedings until 2.30 p.m. on Thursday, February 15th.
Enclosure 4 in No. 13.
EXTRACT FROM THE HONG KONG HANSARD. LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL: SITTING OF
15TH FEBRUARY, 1923.
THE MUI-TSAI BILL.
The Council went into Committee to resume discussion of the Bill intituled, An Ordinance to regulate certain forms of female domestic service.
On the motion of the ATTORNEY-GENERAL verbal amendments were made in several clauses.
H.E. THE GOVERNOR-Does any hon. member desire to raise any further ques- tion in the Committee stage of the Bill?
No hon. member intimating any desire to do so, H.E. THE GOVERNOR proposed that the Bill be reported to the Council and the Council then resumed.
THE ATTORNEY-GENERAL moved and the COLONIAL SECRETARY seconded the third reading of the Bill.
H.E. THE GOVERNOR-Does any hon. member desire to address the Council?
HON. MR. P. H. HOLYOAK-Your Excellency, I crave your permission to dilate somewhat more at length on the remarks which I made in the Committee stage of the Bill at the last meeting of the Council, namely, on the gross misrepresentations of fact which have been made almost throughout the public press at Home, in what I can un- hesitatingly describe as a malicious campaign of propaganda, whether for political purposes or otherwise I know not; but I do know that statements have been made quite publicly at home in connection with this subject which ought not to remain unchallen- ged by this honourable Council in defence of the fair name of the Colony and the good government which it represents. If the statements of wholesale slavery and of the sell- ing of slaves were as true as they have been depicted, then, Sir, I think there is little doubt that it would stand for a judgment not only upon each successive Governor of the Colony who has allowed it to remain but upon the British people of the Colony who have lived under it for the last 70 years. I am not concerned, however, in discussing in detail the subject of mui-tsai. I have voted already for the first reading of the Bill and I am prepared to vote for its final stages, principally because it adds to the annals of the Colony and the laws of the Colony, an Ordinance which is in keeping with other Ordinances of the British Realm. For my own part I do feel sincerely that in a large degree it was perhaps unnecessary because, in practice and in spirit, officially and otherwise, the practice has never received official sanction from beginning to end in the history of the Colony and therefore it seems unnecessary to legislate on the subject. Nor would it have been necessary but for the gross misrepresentation in an agitation representing a somewhat horrible state of affairs which, in fact, does not exist in practice and in the experience of those of us who have lived very many years in this Colony and who know somewhat of the inside of Chinese affairs. I do not think the situation of the mui-tsai in a Chinese household differs so very largely in actual practice from that of a similar practice obtaining at home of adopting an orphan from one of the many orphanages and using her as a domestic assistant and providing her with home, food and clothing. Nor do I think that the ill-treatment which has been so largely described to us is any more widely-spread than that revealed in the ordinary practice of a Magistrate's Court in any large town in England. It is because I have so recently come from home and be- cause both from press and platform and even from pulpit one has heard such atrocious mis-statements of fact that I feel they cannot be passed without challenge by this Coun- eil, affecting as they do the reputation of the Council and the reputation of the Colony.