I fer rich
*
Al
20
property tax, profits on private businesses and
X corporations taxes and salaries taxes. The other
chief line of emergency taxation, viz. increase of
liquor and petrol duties, was put into operation
last October.
On the expenditure side, the chief
increases are under the heading of Air Raid
Precautions, increased Police Staff, increased grants
of various sorts connected with the Refugee problem
and Public Works Extraordinary, the last a
miscellaneous collection, of which important road
improvements in Kowloon will cost 1⁄2 million dollars, the new Teachers Training College nearly million
1
dollars, and new Public Health and hospital
accommodation about 1 million dollars. The new
expenditure proposed to be met on loan account is
almost entirely Water Works expenditure, which is
an ever-pressing problem in Hong Kong. The total
of this exceeds 11⁄2 million dollars. Another
interesting but relatively small amount to be
charged to loan account concerns the preliminary
investigations into a very important scheme for
extending the air-port, mostly by the reclamation
of the sea-shore. Hong Kong has achieved
considerable importance as an international air
junction for air lines to China, Europe and the
United States and with the ever-increasing
performance of modern commercial aircraft and the
absence of any alternative site in Hong Kong for a
large scale aerodrome, one cannot doubt the wisdom
of the investigations now to be undertaken.
The two resolutions for loan expenditure
and expenditure out of the Water Works Renewals Fund,
which are set out in enclosure 3 in No.2, should be
approved, together with the estimates and I see no
reason
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A