Colonial Office
27th May, 1904.
483
16 May;04
Dear Mr Parry,
Very many thanks for your letter and for opening mine to Pittar in his absence. I enclose a letter I have received from him this morning but he has evidently forgotten that the Crown Colonies, though not parties to the Convention, are parties to Articles V and VIII and that French Indo-China is bound to accord to Hong Kong sugars the privileges of Article V. This question was raised at the meeting of the Commission in March and Bergne's reply is given at p.3 of the enclosed Procès Verbaux; no objection was raised at the time by the French Delegate, nor, so far as I know, have the French Government questioned the correctness of Bergne's reply since. Pittar agrees with you and Bergne as regards bounty-fed sugar refined in France after paying the regular countervailing duty and then re-exported.
But please see passage marked in the enclosure to Sir C.Phipps' despatch of 14th August, which forms one of the enclosures to the Circular despatch of 5th November last, of which I enclose a copy. This is a Belgian, not a French regulation, but it raises the point as to which I feel some slight doubt. The Crown Colonies are non-contracting states so far as Article IV is concerned, and so Hong Kong would apparently be obliged to furnish a certificate that the raw sugar used in a Hong Kong Refinery had not come from a bounty-giving...