The proposal now made is the following:-
control of a company partly managed by the French
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The British and Chinese Corporation should negotiate directly with the Chinese Government the granting of the Pekin-Canton Railway reserving, however, in the agreement which would be eventually signed, the right of transferring this Contract to a new British Company to be formed according to the arrangements agreed by the French and English Groups, the principal conditions of which are mentioned above.
If this proposal were accepted it should be understood that the London Office of the new Company to be formed would have the exclusive management of the Hankow-Canton line, which it would manage on behalf of the new Company, and that the Paris office would have the exclusive management, under the same conditions, of the Hankow-Pekin line, each of them consequently having to appoint, for their respective line, the staff necessary in China, the orders for material and the financial advantages being, however shared between the two groups.
The Hankow-Pekin line being now under the control of the French group, it is clear that the proposal hereinbefore stated implies serious advantages to the English Group, since the French Group only asks for the maintenance of the present situation re the staff in the Hankow-Pekin concern and since it yields also to the English group half of its rights re material and financial advantages in the Hankow-Pekin line. Moreover, in the Hankow-Canton concern, the French Group waives the right of appointing the staff, although half of this staff, according to the arrangements between Messrs. Addis and Simon, ought to be appointed by the Paris office.
Such being the case and in compensation for these very material advantages granted by the French Group to the English Group the former merely requests that the English Group bind themselves to support the negotiations which the French Group may enter upon with the Chinese Government in order to obtain contracts for two railways which are entirely outside the scope of the English group, namely:-
(a)