COPY OF A MINUTE ON 54147/49
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Mr. Wallace.
As arranged the Executive Committee of the Inter-University Council gave preliminary consideration to the three despatches at their last meeting. The Committee noted that the general questions of policy have not yet been fully considered by the Colonial Office and that they were not called on, at this stage, to express any final comments on the proposals.
They agreed that it would be preferable to postpone comments by the Inter-University Council both on the general financial plans and on the particular proposal for a department of architecture until after the Council's representatives had visited Hong Kong, unless the situation developed and clarified in a way to require earlier decision.
The Executive Committee made specific comment on the hospital scheme which I have recorded in a minute on 54403/2/1.
I have attached to file No. 54403/2/2 the architect's drawings which I temporarily borrowed.
(SD.) Walter Adams
31st May, 1949.
Page
Page
Sec. 7/906/49.
CONFIDENTIAL.
NO. 55.
Sir,
GOVERNMENT HOUSE,
HONG KONG.
ch 28
March, 1949.
(2) on 54147/49.
I have the honour to refer to paragraph 13 (b) of my confidential despatch No.30 of the 15th February, 1949, and the penultimate paragraph of my confidential
(1)-54403/2/1/49. despatch No. 32 of the 17th February, in which I
indicated that the University of Hong Kong would shortly be submitting an application for a grant to meet the capital expenditure involved in the erection of studios and classrooms for the teaching of architecture. I have now received a formal request from the University for a grant of £11,850 from the allocation for Higher Education under the Colonial Development and Welfare Fund.
2. Before the Japanese invasion, much of the engineering teaching was given in four widely separated small buildings, all of which were looted and destroyed during the period between the Japanese surrender and the arrival of the relieving forces. A site has been prepared where adequate accommodation for engineering and mathematics teaching can be given in a single building that will be in close proximity to those workshops and engineering laboratories which escaped destruction. It is proposed that, in the same buildin accommodation should be provided for the teaching of architecture, so that a maximum use may be made of drawing offices and classrooms with a great economy in students' time and in staff. For architecture, a third floor is added to the accommodation required for engineering. Funds for the building of the engineering accommodation are available out of the Government of Hong Kong's rehabilitation grant of $4,000,000. grant now asked for is to meet the cost of the additional accommodation demanded for the teaching of architecture, an extension of the University's work tha has been long projected.
The
3. The need for the training of architects is acutely felt. Apart from this Government's own staff of architects and a few Chinese and British, who hold British registrable qualifications, the greater number of persons engaged on architectural work are civil engineers who are given local authorization under a Hong Kong Ordinance. Under the conditions that prevail it has been found necessary to register a large number of individuals whose only training in architecture is the relatively trifling amount normally included in a civil engineering course. Many of these men are of considerable competence, but in private practice they work without the wholesome professional restraints implied in membership of one or other of the British institutions. Some are neither competent nor professionally scrupulous.
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
ARTHUR CREECH JONES, M. P.,