Enclosure No.5.
ATTORNEY GENERAL'S CHAMBERS,
HONG KONG, 26th June, 1920.
REPORT ON ORDINANCE No.
8 of 1920.
66
1.
I have examined the accompanying Ordinance intituled
An Ordinance to amend the law relating to societies, and I am
of opinion that the Ordinance is one which is not contrary to
the Governor's Instructions.
2.
The object of this Ordinance is to repeal the Societies
Ordinance, 1911, which has not proved satisfactory in practice,
and to substitute a simpler system based on the Triad and Unlawful
Societies Ordinance, 1887.
3. The Societies Ordinance, 1911, failed to give the
increased control expected, it probably drove several undesirable
societies underground, in some cases it gave a fictitious respect-
ability to doubtful societies on the border line, it supplied a
technical defence to any action brought by an unregistered society,
however desirable the society might be, and it perforce cast the
net too widely and included a great many societies that required
no governmental regulation whatever.
4.
Attention is drawn to section 7, which deals with evidence.
It is believed that the presumptions are necessary, that they are
not too violent, and that they will not work any injustice in
practice. Sub-section (5) is unusual but has some precedent in
Ordinance No.2 of 1889, s. 26(4). The work specifically mentioned
has long been recognised as an authority on the subject of the Triad
Society.
5. A table is appended showing the correspondence between the
sections of the Ordinance and the sections of the two previous
Ordinances.