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HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
4.
The object of the present Ordinance is to meet these points.
5. Section 2 is inserted in order to make it quite clear that the Official Administrator, Official Receiver and Official Trustee are officers of the Government for the purposes of this Ordinance, though they deal with non-Government money.
6. Section 3 provides that all sums of money which, for a period of at least five years, have remained unclaimed in the Treasury, or in the hands of any officer of the Government, shall be at once transferred to the general revenue of the Colony.
7. Section 4 provides for the transfer to the general revenue of future sums which remain so unclaimed, other than (i) the balances of intestates estates and (ii) sums of money in the Supreme Court. These two classes of unclaimed money are dealt with in special ways, balances of intestates estates being dealt with by sections 5, 6 and 7, and sums of money in the Supreme Court being dealt with by section 8. In both these cases the procedure is more elaborate than under section 4. One class of balances of intestates estates is reserved for the simpler procedure of section 4, i.e., balances of intestates estates administered by the Official Administrator under section 19 of the Probates Ordinance, 1897. That section applies only to estates which do not exceed $250 in value. The transfer under section 4 will be made by the Governor under the hand of the Colonial Secretary. The order and any conditions attached thereto will be published in the Gazette.
8. Section 5 provides that where administration is granted to the Official Administrator in respect of the estate of any person who has died intestate, and where a balance from such estate remains in the hands of the Official Administrator and the next of kin of the deceased are not known to him, he shall cause advertisements to be published to the effect that if no claim is made within five years from the date of the first publication of such advertisements in the Colony the balance remaining from the estate in question will be transferred to the general revenue of the Colony, subject to the provisions of the Ordinance. The advertisement has to be published in the Colony, and also in any place where it appears probable that persons entitled to sharing in the residue may be found, if the Official Administrator considers that such further advertisement is desirable. These provisions are also applied to grants made before the commencement of this Ordinance, but it is provided that advertisement under this Ordin- ance will not be necessary in any case where advertisement had already been made before the commencement of the Ordinance in accordance with the law in force at the time of such advertisement. It is also provided that no advertisement will be necessary under the Ordinance where the net value of any estate remaining
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