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Statement made by Mr Rennie so ... an amount of discretion and great responsibility devolves on the Auditor General in connection with expenditure for the Diplomatic and Consular service in China and Japan - an expenditure of from £120,000 to £130,000 annually that I felt it necessary to appoint someone whose position and standing might ensure the confidence of H.M.'s Ministers at Peking and Japan.
At the same time as Mr Austin's appointment involves the sacrifice of one of the Official seats in Council and otherwise lead to inconvenience, I may have requested him to consider it temporary in the strictest sense of the word, as probably when Mr Alexander and Mr Bertram Smith, both now absent on leave, return to the Colony, I should thereby be enabled to make some more suitable arrangement.
At the same time it seems to me clear that no other arrangement could be so expedient or suitable as the early appointment of the officer who is permanently to fill Mr Rennie's place. It is undoubtedly, though I fear a serious and unavoidable drawback to the Civil Service here, that the climate and other causes necessitate such frequent discharge of special and important departmental duties by Officers not conversant with such details. I consider...