4317
99
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O. 882
possesses satisfactory professional qualifications for the task and is entirely unconnected with local affairs.
In these circumstances it will be best for you to abstain from approaching the Company on the subject.
4148
(Confidential.)
SIR,
No. 46A.
I have, &c.,
ALFRED LYTTELTON.
ADMIRALTY to COLONIAL OFFICE.
(Received February 9, 1905.)
[Answered by No. 49a.]
Admiralty, February 8, 1905. I AM commanded by my Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty to acquaint for the information of Mr. Secretary Lyttelton, that they understand that a question is pending as to the Colonial Government at Singapore taking over the docks and wharves belonging to the Tanjong Pagar Docks Company.
you,
2. In this connection, My Lords desire me to state that they have for some time past had under consideration the question of the storage of adequate stocks of coal and patent fuel to meet the requirements at that port. The present situation is unsatisfactory, and this has been a source of great difficulty both to the Admiralty and to the naval officers in command on the station. Moreover, it constitutes a serious danger, owing to the impossibility of making adequate provision for war.
3. According to existing arrangements, there is a contract at the port for the supply of Welsh coal to His Majesty's ships, but, in addition to this stock in con- tractors' hands, their Lordships have laid down a stock of about 15,000 tons of Admiralty patent fuel, of which 10,000 tons is in the custody of the Tanjong Pagar Company, and the remaining 5,000 tons is stacked on the Admiralty property at P'ulo Brani.
4. The latter site is not well adapted for the storage of patent fuel, but their Lordships were compelled to utilize it temporarily for this purpose, owing to the difficulty which arose with the Tanjong Pagar Company in providing storage on their property by the date of arrival of the collier.
5. The patent fuel at Pulo Brani will be issued to His Majesty's ships as early as possible, and the question of obtaining a suitable site for the quantity to be shipped in replacement of issues will require early consideration.
6. In these circumstances, and in view of the importance of Singapore as a coaling station in time of emergency, My Lords desire to place the coaling arrange- ments for the fleet on a more satisfactory footing, and to be in a position to con- siderably augment the stocks of coal and patent fuel at that port at short notice whenever necessary.
7. I am therefore desired by their Lordships to enquire whether Mr. Secretary Lyttelton considers that it would be practicable for some arrangement to be arrived at whereby sufficient space for a total quantity of about 30,000 tons of coal and patent fuel could be reserved for the use of the Admiralty in a convenient situation for coaling His Majesty's ships. In the event of this proposal being concurred in provisionally, I am to suggest that the Governor of Singapore might be communi- cated with, and requested to fully consider the requirements on the spot, in con- junction with the Commander-in-Chief on the China Station, and, in this case. My Lords would send the necessary instructions to the latter upon the receipt of your reply.
8. I am to add that their Lordships will be glad of a reply as early as convenient.
I am, &c.,
SIR,
No. 47.
THE TANJONG PAGAR DOCK COMPANY, LIMITED, to COLONIAL
OFFICE.
(Received February 9, 1905.)
[Copy to Governor, February 16, 1905. No. 41. L.F.]
[Acknowledged by No. 49.]
120, Fenchurch Street, London, E.C., February 9, 1905.
I AM to thank you for your obliging compliance with my request for a copy
of the despatch of the Secretary of State to the Governor of the Straits Settlements, dated 4th November, 1904, which was published in Singapore, in connection with the first reading of the Tanjong Pagar Dock Expropriation Ordinance.
2. I confess, on reading this despatch, to some surprise that arguments have been used for the justification of the rse decided upon by the Government which, I maintain, are contrary to fact, and to some disappointment that greater care has not been taken in the adoption of views the expression of which can hardly fail, in the subsequent more material stages of the proceedings, to prejudice the interests of those so deeply concerned in the issue.
3. Were this Ordinance, as in my humble opinion ought to be practicable, sub- ject to the review of Parliament, my mind would be easy, and I need not trouble the Secretary of State with any criticisms of a despatch of his to one of his adminis- tering officers; but when, as is literally the case, the Government of this country proposes to dispossess British citizens of a property which it is no exaggeration to represent as second in value to no property in the whole of His Majesty's Crown Colonies, without so much as allowing sufficient time or opportunity for the concerned to present their view of the case, I submit there is little need for me to apologise in adopting what, so far as I can see, is the only course left to me.
4. So long as we remained in the belief that the Government was actuated in the course it had decided upon solely by considerations of the highest policy my fellow shareholders and I felt secure that the initial legislative presentment of the case would leave nothing to be desired on the score of fair treatment.
5. When, however, I find that suggestions and representations, inspired apparently by a desire to belittle the value of the property, which the Secretary of State found ready at his hand, have been used without the pretence of an inquiry to substantiate them, as a justification for the Government's decision, I must protest by every means in my power against the injustice of such methods.
6. The whole tenor of the despatch is to represent that the Company failed in an appreciation of its unique responsibilities and was not alert to meet the increasing demands of the port: that its shareholders, as embodied in the Consulting Com- mittee who had all returned home from long residence in the Colony and long direc- tion out there of the Company's affairs had lost all interest in an enterprise which had taken them and their predecessors 40 years to build up, and were now concerned merely in its capabilities as a dividend-paying investment.
7. I most emphatically protest against any such misrepresentation of the Com- pany's attitude towards the Colony or any such distortion of the aims of the London Committee.
8. I take particular exception to the extract from the despatch of the Governor of the Colony in paragraph 5 representing the possibility that parsimony was the policy of the shareholders for the attainment of a dividend which would tell in the event of expropriation.
9. I cannot but believe that His Excellency has by this time ascertained that, however misdirected the expenditure may possibly have been, parsimony at least has not been the watchword, but that an honest endeavour has been made, up to the lights of the management, to keep the enterprise well ahead of its work.
10. But apart from that His Excellency has since doubtless made more par- ticular investigation of say the last ten published accounts of the Company and seen
C. I. THOMAS.
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• No. 19.
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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO