Enclosure.1.
а
11
TO THE RIGHT HOSOURABLE
THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES,
&c.,
&c.,
&c.
Rece
C.O.
17001
1- || MAY OR
The Humble Petition of the undersigned
Subordinate Members of the Civil Service of the
Colony of Hongkong.
}
SHEWETH AS FOLLOWS:
1. Your Petitioners are all persons of Chinese nationality and have been in the Service of the Government of this Colony for, in some instances, as long as thirty years. Whilst in such service they have always endeavoured to discharge the duties of their respective offices with zeal and fidelity, and believe that they have been successful in giving satisfaction to the Government, while they desire to acknowledge the fair and considerate treatment which they have received at the hands of their official Superiors.
2. The grievance to which they now desire to call attention is not one which can in any way be attributed to the action of the Colonial Government and is not therefore one which that Government can be expected to remedy.
3. Your Petitioners allude to the continuous decline in value of the Colonial currency by reason of which the purchasing power of their earnings has continuously decreased and is decreasing. Your Petitioners would not make their present appeal if they considered that the present low value of the silver Dollar was likely to be temporary; but as, on the contrary, they see no reason why it should not continue in the future as it has done in the past to steadily decline, they are of opinion that the serious consideration of this question cannot be longer delayed.
4. In years past the fall in exchange was felt more by those who were in the habit of remitting Money to England and of purchasing commodities of English manufacture than by your Petitioners; and the Government, by intro- ducing the system of Exchange Compensation, applied a sufficient remedy to the grievance as felt by this class of their Servants. Under this system Civil Servants are at present drawing salaries nearly double the nominal amount to which they are officially entitled, while your Petitioners have never had any such general measure of relief extended to them, and the salaries that they draw remain