2
11
7.
With reference to the Hon. Financial Secretary's comments,
para.6, lines 6 to 8, where he writes "The Chamber of Commerce now
requests that they (the 75 year leases) should be exterded to the
standard term of seventy-five years renewable for a further seventy-
five years" this is not the case. Para.49 of our Report (last
sentence) stated:
"The policy approved by the Secretary of State and announced in 1915 seems to us to be the right one
renewal for 75 (not 21) years on payment of a fair rent for the second period, to be determined, failing agreement, by arbitration.
"
This contention is repeated, in different words, in the first
sentence of para. 53.
8.
We came to the conclusion that the seventy-five year lease-
Folders could not expect to cbtain a new lease for the standard term
of 75 plus 75 years unless they paid a premium, but that they might
reasonably ask for a further term of 75 years on payment of a re-
assessed Crown rent, and could plead in support of that request the
Secretary of State's offer of 1915, as subsequently amended to a 75
years instead of a 21 years' extension.
9. The Financial Secretary, in paras. 6, 7 and 8 of his comments,
refers to the decision of the then Governor and Executive Council, and
the then Secretary of State (Lord Derby), in 1885 wher Peak lease-
holders asked for an extension from 75 years only to the practically
freehold tenure of 999 years. The decision then was that the
petition should not be entertained except on the condition of "much
increased premia and Crown rentals". It does not follow, however,
that this would have been the reply if the leaseholders had merely
esked for an extension of 75 years.
10. Towards the end of para. 10 the Financial Secretary quotes Major-General Black as stating about the year 1898 "he presumed that
in Hong Kong, as elsewhere, if the lessee wished to renew at a rent
based on the prevailing value of the land, the Government would grant
him the first offer". In this passage Major-General Black does not
suggest that a fine or premium should be paid on renewal, so that the
Financial Secretary is scarcely justified in his comment that "The