(5)
25
That
is so
8. The position set up by the new financial resolu-
tion therefore apparently is that as each officer dies the Governor
in Council of the time, acting on considerations to which we have no
clue and with regard to which he will have no guidance from the
instrument which gives him his authority, will decide whether it is
"equitable" to pay the widow's pension at the rate which was promised
for 36 years, which we claim (on that and other grounds) as our right,
and which has been promised to us by the Secretary of State as
recently as the 22nd March, 1939.
9. With all proper respect, we are bound to enter
We
the strongest protest against this financial resolution.
cannot regard it as a satisfactory settlement of our claim, and we
must press for its rescission and the restoration of the full effect
of the financial resolution of the 7th August, 1902.
10. In our attempts to find some explanation of the
latest action of the Hong Kong Government in this matter it has
occurred to us that they are perhaps trying to avoid the risk of
having, under the fiancial resolution of the 7th August, 1902, to
pay in England at 3/- some occasional pensionto the widow of an
officer who was himself not domiciled in a sterling country. They
may even wish to exclude the case of all officers recruited locally,