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Colony. Some of the public have no doubt placed an un-
reasonable amount of reliance on the fact of Hongkong regis-
tration, but it seems desirable to endeavour to ensure some
minimum of financial backing in all future fire and marine
insurance companies incorporated here, and the very fact that
a company will carry on all its operations cutside the Colony
makes this the more necessary. It may possibly be a matter
of some doubt whether this section will enable the Registrar
of Companies at Shanghai to insist on the deposit before regis-
tration at Shanghai.
10.
This suggests the subject of existing Hongkong fire and
marine insurance companies which either now do, or in the
future may, confine all their operations to China. It
seems desirable that such companies should also be required
to make deposits, but the difficulty of effecting this by legislation in Hongkong is the old difficulty which arises
from the fact that we have no effective control here over
such companies. This difficulty was overcome in the case
of company law generally by means of the China (Companies) Order in Council, 1915, and the Companies Ordinance, 1915,
Ordinance No. 31 of 1915, and the above Order in Council provides that the jurisdiction of His Britannic Majesty's Supreme Court for China in respect of all British Companies carrying on business in China shall be exercised in conform- ity with the Hongkong Life Insurance Companies Ordinance, 1907. The Order in Council in question, however, contains no words wh which would similarly apply the present Ordinance to any British Companies in China. It is proposed to take up the British authorities in China the question of such existing
with