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- 2.
publication:
nor do I think that a 'dementi' would
do any good at this stage. Briefly, the refugee situation
is as follows:
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
-
Judging by steamer and railway figures of
persons entering and leaving Hong Kong our
population is a bout 200,000 above the normal.
The towns of Victoria and Kowloon ere,
therefore, crammed and, as you know, owing to the
effect of that on rents we have had to legislate
in protection of tenants: I expect that we will
have to do a little more in that line by putting
applications for distress warrants in certain
cases under control by the Bench as we have
evictions.
The
kelatively very few of the refugees are
destitute: this is partly due to the requirement
that each immigrant must be able to shew $20
per head and partly because of the loss in
exchanging Chinese for Hong Kong dollars. Tung Wah Hospitals are looking after some of
the poorest and rely on Government to reimburse
them. The bill is not inconsiderable but we do
not talk about it, as we do not want to attract mor refugees here. The Salvation Army and other
soup kitchens are principally supplying Hong
•
Kong down and outs, i understand: their name
is legion.
I shall have to put up some temporary