30231/7/34 Several
پہلے
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girls who certainly have not been seen for six months
becomes still greater. I venture to suggest that the
number of inspectors should be such that every mui-tsai
would, without fail, be visited once in every three months.
The Committee reports, on page 24, that 'the present
inspectorate appears to carry out the present policy
with reasonable efficiency".
policy" is not quite clear.
The meaning of "present
On the same page, the
Committee suggests that any increase in the staff of
inspectors may be difficult on account of the financial
position of the Colony. As the salary of a Lady
Inspector is 150 dollars a month (Hong Kong currency),the
sun involved is insignificant.
In the last paragraph of my letter of the Ist December last to you, referred to the omission, by an
oversight on my part, of any mention in my memorandum of
the problem of the un-registered mui-tsai, and I expressed
my hope that the Committee would investigate this point.
As the Committee does not refer to it, I fear that my letter
may have escaped attention. If I understand the Committee's
observations in connection with my third question, the
position is that, although the Section 4 of the Ordinance
prohibited any person from taking any new mui-tsai into his
possession after the 23rd February, 1923, new mui-tsai have
been taken into employment ever since. Can it be that this
has happened because there is no other way of obtaining a
new domestic servant ? If not, what is the reason for this
very serious reflection upon the administration of the law?
In any event, one thing is certain:under the law, as it stands,
no new mui-tsai can be registered. In my memorandum upon
the mui-tsai system with reference to the International
Settlements- an enclosure to the last report of the Slavery
Committee- I referred to the strictness of the Hong Kong
legislation in prohibiting the registration of mui-tsai
* No.30231/7134
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