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to say
to attend to business matters, I wish to ask your kind consideration of the hardship and loss to which I have been subjected.
I make bold to state that no official in the Hongkong Civil service who has been appointed from England, or who has held an office usually filled by someone from England, has been subjected to the serious loss I have suffered.
I know of no rule or regulation obliging such a Civil servant to receive on his retirement his pension at the current rate.
The despatch of the Secretary of State, dated the 19th June 1890, clearly recognizes the right of Civil Servants to draw their pension at the rate of 4/2 but laid down that in consideration of the large increase then granted, they should submit to some curtailment of this rate and fixed, in certain cases, the rate at 3/8.
I enjoyed certain privileges such as family remittances, etc., and when Mr. Bruce Shepherd, who was Acting Registrar at the time, forwarded an application for an increase from Mr. Sangster and myself, he asked that we should continue to enjoy the same, but the Secretary of State in granting the additional salary fixed the rate for pension at 3/8, and at this rate Mr. Sangster's pension is paid.
I would also submit the fact that the further loss from exchange since the salaries were increased in 1891 has been so serious that the Secretary of State has granted an additional and considerable increase of the salary of the European Section of the Civil Service.
This last increase showed that the Secretary of State fully appreciated and admitted the hardship which pressed on the English officers of the service by reason of the increase in the cost of living and loss on exchange for insurance and other remittances.
The last increase gives no right to an increase of pension, but leaves the rates at 4/2 or 3/8, as the case may be.
I submit that in my case all this has been ignored and my pension, which like Mr. Sangster's, my fellow Deputy Registrar, should have been paid to me at the rate of 3/8, has been issued only at the current value, which is about 2/2, occasioning very serious loss.
There are reasons which oblige me to reside in the East. I am entitled clearly, if residing in Europe or Australia, to draw my pension at 3/8. I know of no rule which deprives me of nearly half of my pension merely because I reside in Japan, and moreover I submit very confidently that my pension...