U
See also 34112/28
38816/25
5,5
Home Office, the Government have attempted to
mitigate this unfairness by extending the liability
to the Chief Engineer and the Super-cargo. I
propose to go into the question of whether this
amendment is sufficient in connection with the new
draft Ordinance and it seems unnecessary to discuss
it further here.
It is
The reason why it has been necessary in
the past to prosecute Masters of ships carrying
smuggled opium or drugs is given in 30533/25.
that, in view of the terms of Section 36 of the
Ordinance, smuggled drugs cannot be confiscated
unless someone is convicted, der the Ordinance
as it stands the only person who can be convicted is
the Master, that is, of course, unless the Straits
authorities can get hold of the actual persons
involved. In our telegram of the 15th of July on
32183/25 we told the Straits Govemment that we
thought that Section 36 ought to be amended in order
that an illicit consignment could be confiscated even
if no
one were convicted. They have embodied
to give effect to this
ese amendment in the new draft Ordinance
referred to above. But until that is passed, the
position still remains, in my opinion, very
unsatisfactory.
I understand that the reason for making a
Master liable, as is done under Section 12(3), is
that in many cases Masters have been hand in glove
with the smugglers, though it is often impossible to
prove this.
In