COPY.
Sir,
Enclosure No. 1 to Despatch No. 134 of the C.O. 503, 3th April, 1903, T8667, Hongkong, 021/903.
Quarry Bay Inland Lot No. 3,
Referring to your letter of 12th instant in which, under certain conditions, the Government have agreed to grant us a lease for Quarry Bay Marine Lot No. 3 for 999 years, we beg they will also be good enough to grant us the same favour in regard to Quarry Bay Inland Lot No. 3 for the following reasons.
1st. This land was acquired some few months after we purchased Marine Lot No. 3, as we found that the latter lot was not of sufficient area for our Shipyard. Had we discovered this earlier, it would have been included in our application when we approached the Government in regard to Marine Lot No. 3, which was purchased in April 1900.
2nd. When in the following June we found it necessary to acquire this extra strip of land, we asked the Government to grant us an extension of Marine Lot No. 3 which would include it. The Government however, preferred to put it up to auction, the lease being for the same period as Marine Lot No. 3.
3rd.
4th. No leases have been issued for these two pieces of land.
It will thus be seen that the two lots in question were acquired by us, within a few months of each other, for our Shipyard scheme, and, as regards length of lease, they were on the same footing.
5th. It therefore follows that, unless the period of the lease of the two lots is made the same, we shall have some of the most important of our Shipyard works erected on ground held only for 99 years, while the Dock and other portion, to which they are essential, are on ground held for 999 years.
6th. The Government were good enough to recognise, and re-adjust, a similar anomaly in regard to the extension of Marine Lot No. 2 on its being pointed out to them, and we therefore respectfully beg that the Government will allow Inland Lot No. 3 to be treated as an extension.
To the Honourable J. H. Stewart Lockhart, C.M.G., Colonial Secretary, &c., &c.