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HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
26. Clause 21 of this Ordinance assimilates the language of section 61 (1) of the principal Ordinance to that of section 5 (2) of this Ordinance.
WATCHMEN ORDINANCE.
THE ATTORNEY GENERAL moved the first reading of a Bill intituled An Ordinance to amend the Watchmen Ordinance, 1928. He said: The object of this very short Bill is to exempt from the Watch- men Ordinance persons employed by the Air Ministry. I beg to move the first reading.
THE COLONIAL SECRETARY seconded and the Bill was read a first time.
Objects and Reasons.
The "Objects and Reasons" for the Bill were stated as follows:-
It is considered advisable that members of the Air Force and persons employed by the Air Ministry should be placed in the same category as members of the Naval and Military Forces and persons employed by the Admiralty and War Departments respec- tively.
UNCLAIMED BALANCES ORDINANCE.
THE ATTORNEY GENERAL moved the first reading of a Bill intituled An Ordinance to consolidate and amend the law with respect to certain unclaimed balances and certain other unclaimed sums. He said: Certain defects have been discovered in the present Unclaimed Balances Ordinance, 1885. They are matters of technical detail and they are fully explained in the Objects and Reasons, and I do not think that I need go into them more fully, at least at this stage. The Bill re-enacts the main provisions of the present Ordinance, with additions to meet the defects which have been discovered in it. There is one point, perhaps, to which I ought to draw attention, and that is this. The object of the Bill generally, and of the present Ordinance, is to provide for the transfer to the general revenue of the Colony of all sums which remain unclaimed in the hands of officers of the Government, but as it is possible that the claimants-persons who could have claimed these sums may appear even after the transfer to the revenue of the Colony, provision is made in two ways by which they can still pursue their claims. In the first place, they are given the right to apply to the Courts by petition; they are also given the right to apply to the Governor in Council on any moral ground. The present Ordinance which gives these two rights contains no limitation whatever of the legal right, and it has been thought desirable to provide that claimants to any sums which are transferred to revenue shall be barred after such time and in such conditions as they would be barred if they were suing a subject and not the Crown. That provision is taken from the Eng-
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