61
March 27, 1936
CHINA OVERLAND TRADE REPORT
GOVERNOR'S SYMPATHETIC
503
VIEW
THOSE PRESENT
Those present at the Council Meeting included:-
His Excellency the Governor (Sir Andrew Caldecott, Kt., C.M.G., C.M.E.);
His Excellency the General Offi- cer commanding the Troops (Major General A. W. Bartholomew C.B., C.M.G., C.B.E., D.S.O.);
The Colonial Secretary (Hon. Sir Thomas Southorn, K.B.E., C.M.G.); The Attorney General (Hon. Mr. C. G. Alabaster, K.C., O.B.E.);
The Secretary for Affairs (Hon. Mr. R. A. C. North);
The Colonial
(Hon.
Mr. E. Taylor);
Treasurer
Chinese
Hon. Mr. G. W. Tickle (Direc- tor of Public Works);
Dr. A. R. Wellington (Director of Medical Services).
Hon. Commander G. F. Hole, R.N., (Retired) (Harbour Master). Hon. Mr. T. H. King (Inspector General of Police).
Hon. Sir Henry Pollock, Kt., K.C.;
Hon. Sir William Shenton, Kt.; Hon. Mr. J. P. Braga, O.B.E.; Hon. Mr. T. N. Chau;
Hon. Mr. J. J. Paterson;
Hon. Mr. W. H. Bell;
Hon. Mr. M. K. Lo;
Mr. H. R. Butters (Deputy Clerk of Councils).
The Hon. Mr. R. A. C. North and the Hon. Mr. G. W. Tickle both took the Oaths of Allegiance, and assumed their seats as members of the Council.
MUI-TSAI PROBLEM
The Hon. Mr. Jose Pedro Braga, C.B.E. pursuant to notice, asked the following questions:-
com-
1. Will the Government municate to the Council any in- formation in its possession con- cerning the telegraphed report, dated London, March 6, 1936, that Mr. J. H. Thomas has decided to despatch a Commission of Inquiry from Britain to Hong Kong to fur- ther investigate the mui-tsai system?
2. Will the Government inform the Council whether:-
(a) the report is true: (b) if true, at whose expense the Commission will be proceed- ing to Hong Kong; and
(c) if it be at the Colony's ex pense, will His Excellency the Governor forthwith protest. against the Imposition of any further expenditure on local tax · payers in presence of the Colony's unbalanced Budget for the current financial year?
THE ANSWERS
Sir Thomas Southorn answered The Hon Mr. Braga's questions as follows:-
(1) The report is correct and the Honourable Member will be al- ready aware that the Secretary of State has appointed Sir Wilfrid Woods, Miss E. Picton-Turbervill and Mr. C. A. Willis to be members of the Commission. No informa- tion has been received as to when the Commission will arrive. The proposal to appoint a Commission was referred to this Government and was considered in Executive Council where the view was taken that the first conclusion of the Report of the recent Committee on Mui Tsai in Hong Kong (Sessional Paper 8/1935) rendered it desirable to welcome a Com- mission if one should be appointed.
(2) This Government will cer- tainly be expected to contribute a share of the cost.
(3) For the reason given in the first paragraph of this reply the Government is unable to protest in the manner suggested.
HON. MR. LO'S RESOLUTION
The Hon. Mr. Lo Man Kam then rose to move the following mɔ- tion:-
"That in the opinion of this Council the Colony cannot afford tc maintain so 'arge and costly a Civil Service as now exists, and that the Government should take immediate steps to effect al pos- sible retrenchments in the same.'
In moving his resolution the Hon. Mr. M. K. Lo said:-
indul-
Your Excellency,-In rising to move the Motion which stands in my name, I crave that indulgence to a new member attempting his maiden speech, and this gence is all the more necessary be- cause I fear I will have to take up some twenty minutes of this Coun- cil's valuable time in saying what I desire to say in support of this Motion,
The view asserted by the terms of my Motion is that the Colony cannot afford to maintain the existing Civil Service, and I will at once proceed to set out shortly the grounds on which this view is based.
It might have been thought at one time that one of the alleged differences between public and private finance is that, whilst in
venues.
private finance outlay must be gauged and conditioned by income, In public finance the reverse is the case, in that after the expendi- tures are fixed it is the duty of the Legislature to provide the re- But this alleged differ- ence is generally regarded as illu- sory and unsound because the State, like the individual, must in the long run cut its coat accord- Ing to its cloth, and persistent violation of this principle must eventually entail the same conse- quences, alike for State and in- dividual. I unhesitatingly accept the validity of this principle.
What, then, is the present fin- ancial position of the Colony?
The Hon. Mr. N. L. Smith, as Acting Colonial Secretary, in the course of his extremely able and lucid Budget speech on the Sep- tember 12, 1935, after stating that it was anticipated that the es- timated revenue for 1936 would be about a million and a half behind the 1935 revised figures, summed up the position as follows:-
"As a result of all these econo- mies the gap between Revenue and Expenditure has been con- siderably reduced but with the dollar rate taken at 1/8d, which seems a prudent figure, there will still be a deficit, after allow- ing for the surplus balances as mentioned, of about $830,000. The exact figures are Revenue $26,671,845 plus Surplus Balances (in excess of ten million dollars) $2,095,789-total $28,767,634; Ex- penditure $29,598,148."
MUST GO ACCORDINGLY Pausing here I should like to state that, in my humble opinion. the normal revenue of just over twenty six and a half million dollars must be regarded as repre- senting the cloth according to which Government must cut its coat, for I do most respectfully agree with the views recently ex- pressed as to the inability of the Colony to stand the strain of ex- tra taxation, and particularly by Dr. R. H. Kotewall, who spoke in the last Budget Debate as the Senior Unofficial Chinese Member of this Council, that the Colony "is already taxed to capacity. if no beyond it, and any new tax- burdens may be the last straw."
I therefore take the figure of $26,671,845 as representing tip normal revenue for 1936, and the figure of just over twenty nine and a half million dollars as es- timated expenditure for 1936.
The total expenditure includes the items for Military Contribution