HONGKONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
A meeting of the Legislative Council was held on Saturday afternoon. There were present-- His Excellency the GOVERNOR, Sir GEORGE BOWEN, G.C.M.G.
Hon. Sir GEORGE PHILLIPPO, Chief Justice. Hon. W. H. MARSH, C.M.G., Colonial Secretary.
Hon. E. L. O'MALLEY, Attorney-General. Hon. A. LISTER, Colonial Treasurer. Hon. P. RYRIE.
Hon. J. M. PRICE (Surveyor-General). Hon. F. B. JOHNSON.
Hon. F. STEWART (Registrar-General).
THE GOVERNOR'S ADDRESS.
HIS EXCELLENCY said--Honourable Gentlemen of the Legislative Council, On this first occasion on which it has devolved on me formally to inaugurate your deliberations since Her Majesty was pleased to entrust to me the Government of this Colony, I desire to express my confidence that I shall at all times receive your loyal advice and cordial assistance in the labours and duties of legislation. I wish also to explain that, although I have not yet been two months here, I should have called you together at even an earlier period, had it not been for the absence of the only two unofficial members (properly so-called) who now form part of the Council, without whose constitutional co-operation and local knowledge, I was unwilling to enter upon the discussion of any measures of importance. Indeed, had there not been an urgent necessity for passing an Ordinance enabling the Government to carry out the sanitary reforms recommended by Mr. Chadwick (the able Civil Engineer recently sent out by the Imperial Government) I should have preferred to await the commencement of the regular Session which I intend to open in next November; when I hope to have the pleasure of addressing a reconstructed Legislature.
For, gentlemen, I will take this opportunity of informing you officially that, in accordance, as I know, with the opinion of this Council, and of the entire Colony, I firmly believe that the community at large will be better represented and satisfied, while the Government will be more fully informed, and, at the same time, strengthened by the weighty support of public opinion, if the Unofficial element is considerably increased. At the present moment (as I have already said) there are really only two unofficial members; and I have no power to add to their number. I have proposed to Her Majesty's Government that for the future there shall be six unofficial members; and that the system which has worked successfully in Ceylon shall be adopted also here. I mean that two of those six members should be, as a general rule, appointed on the recommendation of the Chamber of Commerce, and one, at least, on the recommendation of some other public body, such as the Bench of Justices of the Peace. One of the six unofficial members will, of course, be chosen from among our Chinese fellow subjects.
It will be remembered that representatives of the native communities have, for many years past, held seats in the Legislatures of British India, Ceylon, New Zealand, and the Straits Settlements. Without going further into details at present, I know that you, gentlemen, will agree with me in thinking that a system of the nature thus shadowed forth will confer on the Colony most of the advantages, without any of the drawbacks, of popular election; which, for obvious reasons, is impracticable in a heterogeneous community, circumstanced as is that of Hongkong.
Should the Imperial Government sanction my proposals, I feel confident that the Colonial Government and Legislature will derive valuable assistance from the knowledge and ability of the gentlemen recommended by the Chamber of Commerce.
But the official and the unofficial members alike can have no object in view but the general welfare of the Colony; and I am sure that we shall work together cordially towards that common object.
I spoke just now of my intention to open a regular session of the Colonial Legislature in November. I find that the practice here, entirely at variance with the practice of most other colonies, has been to summon the Legislative Council at rare and uncertain intervals. I have decided that, here as elsewhere, there shall, in future, be a regular annual session, beginning in November, at the commencement of the cool season; of course, without prejudice to the summoning of extraordinary meetings whenever they may be required by the exigencies of the public service.
While I was Governor of Mauritius, I introduced in that Colony, with the sanction of the Imperial Government, and greatly to the public advantage, the system of an annual session and of an annual recess. I propose that during each recess, the business of the ensuing session shall be carefully prepared by the Governor and the Executive Council.
Each annual session, here as elsewhere, will be opened by the Governor with a short address containing a programme of the legislative and other business to be taken in hand; explanations of the reasons for proposing every Ordinance and measure; and a general review of the material, financial, and social condition of the Colony.
The Legislature will thus be accurately informed of the requirements of the Public Service, and enabled to afford the Government effective aid in settling its financial and general policy.
Again, here as in other Colonies, each annual session will be closed by an address from the Governor summing up the proceedings of the year, and reviewing the general condition and prospects of the community.
There can be no sound reason why the Legislature and Public of Hongkong should not enjoy the same advantages of being officially made acquainted with the views and intentions of the Government as are enjoyed by the Legislature and public in other colonies.
With regard to the measures to which your attention will be directed this day, the most important is, of course, the "Order and Health Amendment Ordinance,” of which the main object is to empower the Government to undertake those "strong and complete measures of sanitation for the immediate benefit of the Public Health," which Mr. Chadwick has declared in his report to be of primary and urgent necessity, if we would not wait for that necessity to be demonstrated by the irresistible logic of a severe epidemic."
It was a wise and witty saying of the late Lord Beaconsfield, when Prime Minister of England, to the effect that a well-known text of Holy Scripture must have been mistranslated, and that, instead of "Vanitas vanitatum, omnia vanitas," it should be "Sanitas sanitatum, omnia sanitas"; that is, that the health of the people should be a primary object of public care.
This question of sanitary reform is indeed grave and weighty, for you will recollect that it brings with it many consequences, intellectual and moral, as well as physical. It embraces almost everything that has to do with the daily life and dwellings of the people; it embraces their free and pure enjoyment of the chief elements of nature-- air, light, and water; it embraces almost everything that tends to give us and our families sound minds in sound bodies—the "mens sana in corpore sano" of the Roman poet.
With regard to the only other measure on the paper for this day, the Tramways' Ordinance, this is not a Government Bill, and its object and provisions will, I am sure, be ably explained by the experienced unofficial member who has brought it forward.
In conclusion, gentlemen, I desire to congratulate you on the great progress which Hongkong has already achieved. It is a very remarkable fact that the shipping which now annually enters this port is of nearly four millions tonnage; that is, it is nearly equal to the tonnage of the shipping which entered the Port of London in 1837, the year of the accession of the present sovereign, at a period six years previous to the first foundation of this Colony, when this island was little more than a desolate rock occasionally visited by a few Chinese pirates and ...