-
5.
J
49
facilities or a subsidy to any other competing Company and
is restricted to the first five years during which the
subsidy is payable I am of opinion that this request might be complied with.
9.
It is fully realized from the start that the
scheme as a regular business investment involves serious
risks and that it may not impossibly end in collapse and the
loss of such subsidy as it may be decided to grant. But the
purely business side of the matter is perhaps not the most
important: China affords enormous opportunities for commercial
aviation, which cannot help but be invoked, and that in the
near future, to make good the lack of convenient communicat-
ions. The advantage of being first in the field may be held
to justify the enterprise even from the merely commercial
point of view; but if the Company is a well managed British
Company, with British machines and aviators, the experiment
acquires a wider Imperial importance, which can fairly
balance the risk of the loss of the subsidy. The promise
of the subsidy would in any case depend on the public
subscription of the capital required, viz., $400,000; the
construction of a hangar, and perhaps of more than one, out
of public funds appears to be necessary in any case, if
advantage is to be taken of Kai Tak Aerodrome for other than
Royal Air Force work; and the Radio and meteorological
assistance required are small matters. There is no reason to think that Chinese cannot easily become "air-minded".
The question has been fully discussed with a
full appreciation of the risks and difficulties involved, and I am prepared to support the advice of the Executive Council and of the Finance Committee of Legislative Council, and to request permission to arrange for the financial and
10.
other