17
After much discussion, in 1891 the system was put on a statutory footing by the Public Accounts and Charges Act, 54 & 55. Victoria, chapter 27. Section 2 deals with all such receipts as appropriations in aid, under the direc- tion of the Treasury, of money provided by Parliament for any purpose, and as such they are so applied and audited and dealt with. The suggestion that such receipts are not authorised by Parliament disappears. The second memorand- um shows in detail in the case of a payment by the present appellant Company for services similar to those the subject of the present appeal, the progress of the particular pay- ment through the various Revenue Authorities, till at last it is sanctioned as an appropriation in aid under the head "Miscellaneous Receipts" by the Appropriation Act for the year, and this is devoted to the relief of the sum voted by Parliament.
I am therefore of opinion that the appeal fails on the following grounds: (1) That there is no duty en- forceable by the Courts on the Crown to render the services for which the Appellants ask. The matter is one for the uncontrolled discretion of the King as head of the Army, both as to whether he shall afford such protection against such anticipated, not actual danger, and as to the terms on which he should afford it; (2) There is no compulsion on the Appellants to make the payment of which they com- plain; but if they want the services they must pay for them if the King requires them so to pay; (3) The payment, where made, is sanctioned and controlled by Parliament in the Appropriation Act under the system of appropriation in aid under the Act of 1891.
The appeal must be dismissed with costs.
LORD JUSTICE LAWRENCE: The Plaintiff Company is an English
Company incorporated under the Companies Acts and carries on an extensive shipping business in Chinese and neigh- bouring waters. These waters have for some considerable time past been infested by Chinese pirates and frequent piratical attacks have been made on ships belonging to the Plaintiff Company and other owners both from without and within the ships. An important part of the Plaintiff Company's business consists of carrying Chinese passengers travelling from one port to another along the coast, and the Plaintiff Company and other owners have found it difficult to prevent pirates coming on board their ships in the guise of passengers and then overpowering the master and crew and taking forcible possession of the ship and her cargo.
Various expedients for preventing this form of piracy have been tried in vain, the Plaintiff Company and other owners, (being unwilling to give up the Chinese passenger traffic which constituted a valuable section of their trade) in the Autumn of 1928 approached the military authorities in Hong Kong and London and urgently requested them to provide military guards to be carried on their ships. In response to such request the military authori- ties in the month of October 1928, whilst maintaining that the defence of ships against internal piracy was essent- ially a matter for the owners to deal with, eventually agreed as a temporary emergency measure to provide armed guards on as many British ships carrying Chinese passengers as was reasonably practicable in view of the limited number of soldiers at their disposal on the China Station.
6.