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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O. 882
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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO
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SIR,
No. 72.
GOVERNOR SIR J. ANDERSON to MR. LYTTELTON.
(Confidential.)
(Received April 1, 1905.)
Government House, Singapore, March 6, 1905.
I HAVE the honour to transmit, for your information, the press reports of the discussion in the Legislative Council on the second reading of the Tanjong Pagar Dock Com- pany Expropriation Bill.
"Free Press," March 4, 1905.* "Straits Times," March 4, 1905.
2. Committee stage has, in accordance with an arrangement made some time ago with the Company, been fixed for the 17th of March current; and its repre- sentatives on the Council will, no doubt, move an amendment to the Compensation Clause of the Bill to provide for the usual 15 per cent. addition for compulsory purchase.
3. In accordance with your instructions the Government will, of course, oppose any amendment to that effect, but the provision in the Bill which requires the new Board to pay to the Government 5 per cent. per annum on the amount required to buy out the Company and pay the costs of the arbitration seriously weakens us in defending the refusal of an addition for compulsory purchase. It will be argued that the Government, while pretending to act solely in the public interest, is really expropriating the Company in order to secure for general revenue an annual pay- ment of something like per cent, on the amount of the purchase money, and that this payment will have to be met either by depriving the existing shareholders of part of the compensation to which they are entitled, or by increasing, or at any rate maintaining at an unnecessarily high rate, the charges on shipping.
4. It is essential in the public interest that the new Board should be self sup- porting from the start, and, for the purpose of the contemplated improvements and extensions, it will, of course, have the advantage of being able to borrow on the credit of Government, but, even with that advantage, if the new works are to be pressed on as rapidly as they should be, unless the award of the arbitrators is lower than I expect, it would be difficult for the new authority to make ends meet without assistance.
5. In the circumstances, as I have already informed you by telegraph,t I pro- pose, with your concurrence, to amend the clause so as only to require the Harbour Board to recoup the Government for its actual outlay and expenditure.
Enclosure 2 in No. 72.
I have, &c.,
JOHN ANDERSON.
EXTRACT from the "STRAITS TIMES" of 4th March, 1905.
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
Friday, 3rd March.
PRESENT.
His Excellency the Governor, Sir John Anderson, K.C.M.G.
Hon. F. G. Penney (Colonial Secretary).
Hon. W. R. Collyer (Attorney-General).
Hon. A. Murray, C.E., M.I.C.E. (Colonial Engineer).
Hon. E. C. H. Hill (Auditor-General).
Hon. J. O. Anthonisz (Colonial Treasurer).
Hon. G. S. Murray.
Hon. W. J. Napier, D.C.L.
Hon. Tan Jiak Kim.
Hon. W. P. Waddell.
Hon. W. H. Shelford.
Hon. J. Turner.
Col. Watts, Notts and Derby Regiment (Officer Commanding the Troops).
• Not reprinted.
+ No. 57.
Hon. E. W. Presgrave.
ABSENT.
Hon. R. N. Bland (Acting Resident-Councillor of Malacca). Hon. J. K. Birch (Acting Resident-Councillor of Penang).
TANJONG PAGAR BILL.
EXPROPRIATION SCHEME DISCUSSED.
SECOND REAding CarriED.
The Colonial Secretary moved, and the Colonial Engineer seconded, the reading of the Bill to provide for the acquisition by the Government of the Straits Settlements of the undertaking known as the Tanjong Pagar Dock Company, Limited, and for the management of the same."
MR. NAPIER SUPPORTS GOVERNMENT.
Mr. Napier prefaced his remarks upon the Bill by an allusion to the fact that Mr. W. H. Shelford had taken his seat in Council that day for the first time. He was the son of a most distinguished past member of the Council who occupied a unique position and who rendered invaluable service to the Colony. Mr. Napier felt sure he had the approval of the Council in saying that he was confident that the new member would prove to be a worthy son of a worthy father. (Applause.) With regard to the Bill now before the Council, he would like to say a word or two as to his own position in the matter. His firm had for some years been retained by the Tanjong Pagar Dock Company, and naturally followed that he would have been only too glad to have assented to the request made to him to oppose the Bill. But some years ago, he formed a definite enough opinion with regard to what he thought ought to be the future of Tanjong Pagar, and, therefore, acting as he did as a "trustee for the public," and not as a mandatory of the Company," he had to support the measure now before the Council. When he said he supported the Bill he thought he might fairly say he believed that public opinion, out- side those who were interested in the Company, was practically unanimous in favour of the Bill. The true ground of expropriation, to his mind, was that which His Excellency the Governo stated on the first reading of the Bill when he, after pointing out that the Company had obtained a practical monopoly of the shipping facilities of the port, stated that in his opinion it was very undesirable in the interests of the commerce of the place that the whole of the shipping facilities should be under the control of the Company, and that he did not make or imply any complaint against the management hitherto. It stood to reason if the docks were worked solely in the interests of the port they must be worked more advantageously for the port than if they were worked by a commercial company which had first to look to the dividends of the share- holders and after that to the facilities and cheapness of the place. And in support of that he would remind the Council of the great success which had been obtained by Port Trusts in other parts of the world, notably on the Clyde and the Mersey, and in Bombay. A good deal had been said with regard to the conduct of the Company's administration, and from the speeches lately made it appeared that some attack had been made on the management of the Company. To his mind the downfall of the Company was really the result of natural laws. When the Company was first formed and the first dock opened, Mr. Thomas Scott, then Chairman of the Company, said the concern was not the offspring of a grasping spirit of monopoly, nor of a desire to monopolise everything. "Let us," he said, "endeavour to be on friendly terms with all our neighbours. Let our motto be 'Live and let live." This spirit was not, however, ultimately carried out. The directors of a commercial company were bound to look after the interests of their shareholders, and the Company has gradually built up a monopoly which their first chairman expressly discountenanced. They took over the Slipway, the Borneo Wharf. and Jardine's Wharf, and they entered into a joint purse arrangement with New Harbour Dock and subsequently acquired it. It appeared to him that it was this monopoly and the lack of provision which it naturally engendered, and further the large amount of personal influence that such a Company possessed, that had really proved to be its ruin. Mr. Napier here quoted a long extract from an article by Mr. John Dill Ross written about 1888, which he considered put the position of the Company very clearly at the time, and from which it would be seen that it was not owing simply to the Boxer outbreak that the want of facilities at the Docks arose. The writer made a remark which he (Mr. Napier) always felt sympathy with. It was this:- Tanjong Pagar interest is a very powerful one, indeed, it is not considered quite right or respectable to say anything about Tanjong Pagar." Finally, Mr. Ross remarked, "To amateurs of big dividends who may say that all is for the best, some reference may be hinted to the ancient fable which demonstrates that the goose which lays the golden eggs is not necessarily a long lived bird." This prophecy by Mr. Ross, Mr. Napier proceeded, was apparently about to come true. If this was the position then, it was quite clear from the papers before then that in 1900 or 1901 the position had not been improved, because they found Mr. Stringer, in his reply to Mr. John Anderson, at a Tanjong Pagar Dock Company meeting, admitting trying to "re-establish that confidence in the management which he greatly feared had to a very large extent been shaken." Then they had the statement of the Consulting Engineers, who said that the existing facilities were taxed to the utmost and were entirely inadequate to meet the increasing demands of the port. He was very anxious to give due credit for everything done since that date, because he knew that a great deal had been done. In a letter of September, 1901, addressed to the London Committee, which Mr. John Anderson read at a meeting that they could all probably call to mind, he set out the then pressing needs of the port, and there was no doubt that a number of those pressing needs had been looked to. There was no doubt that a large increase of warehouse accommodation had been effected, increased berthage had been provided, and the wharf itself-although it had never been straightened--was in better condition now than he had ever seen it before, and, further, the new system of railways would prove a very great help to the commerce of the place. But for all that there were certain features of the