PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
TIC.O. 882
5 PUBLIC RECORD OFFIC
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSISSIDE THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH~~NOT TO
DON
Gritillan
Dr July 1999.
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COLONIAL CURRENCY COMMITTEE:
India Company did not care about the wishes of the people, and did not understand our customers; they inale a determined attempt to introduce the rupee. As a matter of fact, in my early days, all the taxes were paid in rupees, although all ́mercantile transactions were in dollars.
480. I did not ask if it would be possible to give the dollar exclusive circulation. I put a repetition of what I thought you said, that you might give the dollar an artificial value in Singapore, but you could not compel it outside ?—I emphasised that; you could not compel it outside, but I would not commit myself to saying that it could be done within.
481. The rupee had a value attributed to it ?—It had with transactions with the Government, but it had no currency for business purposes.
482. That is quite different question. Now I want to put this question. The recent legislation in India by the Viceroy in Council has given the rapee an artificial value in India ?—Yes.
483. Has it not given the rupee an artificial value all over the world ?—Hardly, I should think.
484. Cannot it command a value in London different from the value of the silver contained in it? So far as that you can send it to India, no doubt. 485. You said that a dollar of 24 rupees would be nearer the value than a dollar of 2 rupees ?—It is
nearer.
486. Do not you mean nearer in weight ?—In in- trinsic value.
487. Do not use that dangerous word "value,” It would be nearer in weight, that is an absolute fact. But taking the rupee at its present sterling worth, a two-rupee piece would be nearer the value of a dollar than a two-and-a-quarter-rupee piece ?—I think, as a matter of exchange the rate between dollars and rupees went down to 185. On that basis it would be more than a dollar.
488. Two rupees should be worth more than a dollar. Though it is true as a matter of weigh, two- and-a-quarter should be nearer in weight, as a fact two rupees are nearer the value of a dollar than 24 rupees -If a native were given two coins of equal weight and fineness it would be rather difficult to show him one should have greater value than the other, and only give that value for immediate exchange.
489. (Mr. Meade.) Does your firm export goods? --Export and import.
490. It distributes what it receives for the East and from the East ?--Yes.
491. Through your own agency or by Chinamen ? -We send to Singapore.
492. That is the point I wanted. Yon are not the exporters; you have goods at the entrepôt; you send gols to the entrepôt to the people who do distribute them?-After being brought to Singapore we do not ship the goods to different parts. We ship from England to Singapore and from Singapore to England. 498. But as regarvis the East, you are not exporters from Singapore?-From the Straits Settlements to Eastern ports we are not exporters. That is chiefly lone by Chinamen; and in the more distant parts by the various races.
494. Does no Englishman compete with the China- men for the trade to Java? Does it all go through the middleman ?-Mainly. I was there for years, and though we had a firm in Java, we had very few tran- sactions in the way of shipping commodities from one country to the other.
405. (Chairman.) What are the commodities that go from Singapore to Netherlands Indlu and Java ? --A considerable quantity of rice and opium.
496. Have you any cotton goods?—Not a very large quantity. The goods that come in course of tran-shipment are en route for Java and elsewhere beyond Singapore. Articles of English production, cotion goods and so on, may be sent down to Java wood Macasear in that way.
407. (Mr. Meade.) Goods are distributed from Singapore by Chinamen, as they are from Hong Kong,
Inasmuch as Chinamen are now steamship owners ?— Yee. I do not think they are successful with the steamship lines in the Straits, and I think that business is falling into the hands of Englishmen.
498. In the Straits?-In the Straits.
499. (Mr. Courtney.) Are these Chinamen natura- lised subjects in Singapore ?--Yea, many of them, Some are born in the colony.
500. In the Législative Council P-Yes, several.
501. (Lord Farrer.) The Dutch Government have managed to make their guilders worth more than the Intrinsic silver value throughout the world, have they not ?-Throughout their own territory.
502. But those guilders are accepted in trade with Singapore or in trade with England?-Really at silver value.
503. If the guilder is exported it is taken as silver, on all accounts, at Java and Singapore. Guilders are on a gold basis, are they not ?-I do not quite understand the drift of your last remark.
504. Rather, the trade between Java and England is carried on as if both were gold countries, is it not ?-Java and England?
305. As if both were gold countries; there are no fluctuations?—There is greater stability.
506. Therefore, as to trade, it seems possible for a country to raise the value of coinage artificially ?-For its own country.
507. And for the purpose of trading with a gold country? It has often occurred to me, one wanted to know what was done in Java, and I have asked neighbours engaged in the Java trade how the Dutch managed to keep up the artificial value. I have always been told the thing was absolutely impossible for the Straits aud for India. But it has occurred to me whether we could not learn something from the example of the Dutch, seeing that they secure a steady exchange in Java. I think that is a point on which we should have information. I do not pretend to have it myself.
508. (Mr. Courtney.) Do you know, supposing a Chinaman sends rice from Singapore to Java, is the contract he enters into with the Dutchman in guild. erg ?-He would sell the property in Java by the guilder.
309. (Lord Farrer.) Is it not the fact that ex- change between Java, with the Dutch guilder, and Singapore, which has a silver standard, has fluctu- ated with the difference in value between gold and silver?-That I could not answer. I should think probably you would have great variations, but I have not been watching it closely.
610. I ask whether exchange between Java and England has not been steady as between gold countries?--That I can answer definitely. It has been fairly steady.
But it was
511. Does it not follow that the other has not been stealy ?-In my young days there was a trade in Singapore exporting guilders from Java to England. How that was stopped I do not know, found to answer to ship guilders, and this was done largely by the bankers, who shipped guilders up to Calcutta to be melted dowu and turned into rupees.
512. Was that the time when Holland and Java had a silver standard ?—I think they had.
513. It would scarcely be worth while to take guilders now?—It would not be worth while to do it
now.
614. (Sir R. Welby.) Did I understand you to my that you were in Singapore when the East India Company's rupee was in tender there ?—Yes.
515. Did that lead to inconvenience? I under- stand that the rupes was taken in payment of taxes, and Government accounts were in rupees, while all ordinary business was done in dollars. Was there friction in getting the rupees to pay the Government taxes ?—No, I think that was just met by the bankers in Singapore and Penang keeping a certain supply of rupeca.
516. But with the inland population it did not lead
to difficulty ?—No, there was very little difficulty. Asa
MINUTES OF EVIDENCE
matter of fact, up to the present time, so strong is the prejudice in favour of old ways, and so much wedded are the people to old ways, that there are certain things in Singapore for which you still pay the rupee, that is, you do not pay the rupee but its equivalent in cents. The understanding was that for carriage you paid a rupee, or a rupee and a half, and for some things you still pay so much in Java rupees. There was no Java rupee changed hands; but as I remember, it was 38 cents, and you gave a man 38 centa for the lighterage of a certain quantity of cargo, and rupees came in favour in transactions of that kind, just as you pay a cabman asbilling in London; it came to be recognised.
517. I gather that if this idea that has been broached of a double rupee, or whatever you like to call it, were introduced, the practice would be the same as in the Straits under the East India Company. This coin would be used for the payment of Govern- ment dues, and other transactions would remain in dollars?—Yes. Of course, if the Government made their gold dollar, or double rupee, the legal tender for everything, it would introduce greater complication than at that time, because we then successfully re- sisted the attempt to introduce the rupec in business transactions.
518. Besides, the two coins were interchangeable ?—— Yea, and they had value in proportion to weight
519. Supposing this coin were introduced under the name, as you yourself mentioned, of British dollar, and supposing it to be on a gold basis, would there be some difficulty in introducing it ?—I think there would be some difficulty. Suppose you have a British dollar which is exactly the same in fineness and weight as the Mexican dollar, and you propose to give that coin an artificial gold value, while the Mexican dollar has not that artiōcial value, that must necessarily cause con- fusion in all matters. As a matter of fact, the Japanese yen is largely used in Singapore now, it being of the same weight and fineness as the Mexican dollar; but if you were to introduce the British dollar with an artificial value I think it would be rejected.
520. Is the yen recognised ?—It is a legal tender in the Straits Settlements.
521, (Mr. Meade.) If this change were made which has been advocated, would you anticipate or not any dissatisfaction and possible consequent dis- turbance on the part of the native population at having to pay more silver than before for dues to Government? Hitherto the Chinsmen and Malay population have paid their dues in Mexican dollars; if they had to pay the coin of artificial value, the two-rupee piece, how would they view that ?—Undoubtedly you would have dissatisfaction. Look at it from the point of view of a man who has land and who has to pay a certain quit-rent of so many Mexican dollars; you cannot get away from that; you cannot say to the man, “You will have to pay us in the double rupee, for which you will have to pay in the market a dollar and a quarter;" there would be the loudest dissatisfaction; I should feel it myself.
522. That would be a strong case.
523. (Mr. Fairfield.) Was it not decided by the Supreme Court of Hong Kong that a contract expressed in silver must be paid in silver, notwithstanding any change in currency? They introduced sterling as legal tender in Hong Kong. There were certain persons who claimed to be paid on past contracts in sterling, but the Supreme Court held that they were still silver contracts and might be paid in silver ?--I think so. I think I enw that stated in a book recently published on the currency of the Colonias, published by some one connected with the Colonial Office.
524. (Lord Farrer.) The objection would depend on the question whether the value of the coin were actually raised or not?-Of commo.
325. Suppose you kept the dollar from lowering ?— There would be no dissatisfaction.
526. Unless you could keep the Mexican dollar from further lowering, and if the Mexican dollar were not legal tender, there might be dissatisfaction ?~— Suppose so many Mexican dollara had to be paid for
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land, or a lean, or whatever it might be, and a man found that he had to pay in a coin" for which he had to pay in the market one dollar and a half, there could not fail to be dissatisfaction.
527. But suppose the choice is between that and having to pay more Mexican dollars to make up the revenue, would it make much difference? Suppose, in consequence of the fall in silver, it were necessary to obtain more revenue, and that revenue were obtained by raising the value of the currency, would that be more objectionable than increased taxation ?—It would be, because it would be regarded as a breach of faith on the part of the Government.
528. Suppose that the evil was aggravated by a further fall in silver, suppose that the repeal of Sherman's Act and the consequence of that and what is done in India were to cause a further fall in silver, would that alter your view as to the expediency of doing anything 2-—I do not think that it would alter it. 529. You do not think that it would alter it ?—No. One point occurred to me which I thought probably you would ask me about, that is, What is the effect on the colony of the depreciation in silver as regards the exporting business, and importing business into Singa- pore from Europe? Of course it in diverse. It makes us need to enforce higher prices from the buyer for what we import, but, on the other hand, for the products that we buy in the East the result of the fall in silver is, that we have to give higher prices
for their commodities to the natives.
530. You have to give a higher silver price ?— Perhaps the best example, the one that struck me in my business, is with regard to tin. It is largely pro- duced in the Malay Peninsula, it may be said to be the chief product. Speaking roughly, the product of tin is in the neighbourhood of 40,000 tons. I was calenlating, when talking of the silver question, what was the difference in price paid for that 40,000 tons compared with the amount that was paid in silver ten or twelve years ago, when I was in Singapore, and roughly 1 put it at about 6,000,000 dollars that was being paid extra for this quality, taking the production as it is just now that we were paying 6,000,000 dollars to the Malay States or the producers-it grad- ually filters through the States—these 6,000,000 dollars.
531. (Chairman.) 6,000,000 dollars added to what would be the cost of 40,000 tons ?-Taking it at 907. a ton, 3,600,000%.
532. In dollars—what is the silver price ?—about 21,000,000 dollars.
533. (Mr. Courtney.) Then you are paying half as much again ?—No, it must be more. I got that in my head from speaking from memory, and when you spoke to me about coming here I found it was correct. It was about 6,000,000 dollarṣ to 6,500,000 dollars, more or less. Here is a comparison of prices :-
London Prices.
Tear.
Singapore Prices.
E1.
+ 1879
1800 - $1.50 $1.10 = 26.30
11:01. 26.75 34.75 = 30.75
17.00
J. d. s. d.
a. d.
50 10 960 = 78
71 0 970 = 84
87 0 108 10 = 95
A 3 10)= 39
$† 3 10 = 394
Mean $18.30
3409 - 8435 46.10) 87.38
Roughly, $10 per picùl extra on pla. 800,000 = $1,500,000. and I may add that the European consumer of tin in 1992 was not paying more than in previous years, when, as a matter of fact, the price paid for, the pro- duction of the would have been, say 6,000,000 dollars less to the States.
584. (Mr. Courtney.) Your experience in tiu goes back many years ?--- Yen.
585. Are you not aware that prices have been very variable-Yee, I have taken the extremes and the
mean.
536. (Chairman.) Though the mean price of tin at the present time is not very different from 1882 the
C 2
Mr. S. Gilfillan.
12 July 1603.