37
the Captain Superintendent of
Registrar
Police and the Registrar General.
anyway
do not appear to have in
altered since that
7.
year.
It would seem
therefore that the only
reason for proposing to remove the Treasurer from the position assigned to him is that he happens not to have had the same length of service as the officers whom it is proposed to pass over his head, but I would respectfully submit that, as the
Treasurer now holds his seat on
Council ex officio, in the same
the Colonial Secretary
unanimously and
and Attorney General hold theirs, it is somewhat hard (especially after a lapse of five months, during which period he has been
permitted to regard
his position as secure) that he should be subjected
to exceptional treatment in favour
of
of two nominated members, merely because he happens to be junior
more
to them, and this treatment is the more striking in that it entirely differs from that accorded to his predecessor, whose position vis à vis the Captain Superintendent and
the
the Registrar General was identical with that now occupied by Treasurer vis à vis the present
Registrar General.
Unless this is to be regarded
as an
exceptional
arrangement, in which case I can but regret that I am the victim of circumstances, the Treasurer of Hongkong will be placed in the anomalous position of never knowing what his position will
be a
year ahead, for though he may regard it as certain that length of service will never be allowed to count in his favour so
as