་། ༴། ་། ་།
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
19
سسسلسلا
Reference :-
C.O. 882
9
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE | BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-
COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
16
23 July 1909)
1
MAURITIUS ROYAL COMMISSION, 1909 :
Mr. Justice DAVSON.
13,162 Mr Woodcock.) May we say 14 hours a week Yes. may say it is not more than that
peaking of the year 1908).
13.13. That is actual sittings in court? Yes, actual sittings in court. I am not counting the work done in considering judgments and work done out of
court.
13,164. What other work did you do in the build- g-Chamber work
13.165. (Chairman) What chamber work would you do in the course of a week !---Of course, on the day I was not sitting in court, I would be chamber judge, and chamber work, unless I have been exceptionally fortunate, is very slight. I do not suppose, if one struck an average or, speaking for myself, if 1 struck an average, it certainly is not an hour's work a day.
13.166. (Mr. Woodcock.) How many hours a week? -If I wat in chambers every day, for instance, it would be five hours a week.
13,167. But I mean to take a week when you are sitting as judge. when you sit, as you have told us, 14 hours a week. In that particular week, how many hours would you sit as judge in chambers?--In that particular week I would probably be only one day as judge in chambers, and very often we have had nothing more than a few affidavits to swear.
13,168. (Chairman.) Then your work actually in the court would be 15 hours a week last year -Yes. Of course it is very difficult to say off-hand, but I think that that would be about right.
13,169. Where were you before you came here t—I was in British Guiana.
13.170. For how long ?-About 23 years.
13.171. Were you a judge in the Supreme Court there? No, at first I was practising at the "bar privately, then I was a stipendiary magistrate; then I was a Law Officer (1 was Solicitor-General), and while 1 was Solicitor-General I frequently acted as Attorney- General.
13.172. Do you know anything about the work of the judges there -Yes, not as a judge; I acted once
for six weeks.
13,173. How would you say the work of a judge in British Guisus compared with the work of a judge in Mauritius -I should say a judge there had to work probably about twice as hard, twice the number of hours that he has to do here.
13.174. There was twice as much work in British Guiana for a judge as in Mauritius -I am speaking specially of last year and the work here has been lighter than ever; that is comparing it with the very lightest
year.
13.175. Comparing it with last year?----Yen.
13,176. Then you think that the work of a judge here is extremely light - Yes, I do.
13.177. Have there been four judges all the time
that you have been here, or three ?-You mean actually working.
13.178. Yo-Of course there has always been an establishment of four.
13.179. Yes but actually working ?--No, at the last term of last year, one of the judges was on leave in Bourbon, and his place was not filled up.
13,180. If there were only three judges here, would there be any difficulty when one bad to go on leave or if he got ill-There would be no difficulty if an acting appointment were made as in the ordinary case.
I do
not think that two judges would be able to get through the work; you would hare to appoint an acting judge. in the same way as now an acting judge is appointed when there are four judges, but whereas now, if one judge goes away you could do with the remaining three, if you had only an establishment of three you would always have to appoint an seting judge.
19.181. Do you know anything about the magis trates -I do not know anything about the amount of work which they have to do, because we have no adminia- trative control over them; we cannot call upon them for a return of the hours that they sit. For instance, we
'Note by Mr. Justice I'avion-On consideration 1 think this is somewhat exaggerated; I would prefer to put it "very considerably harder.C.B.D.
[Continued.
sit and review their decisions, so that I culy have a general knowledge of their work.
13.182. What is your general idea with regard to it !-What I mean by that is as regards the question of reducing the numbers.
+
13,183. That is the object of my question ?-Leaving out Port Louis, where there are three magistrates, assuming three are required there, there are, I think, 10 districts, counting Rose Hill and Curepipe as two, and I think there are more magistrates than districts. I think that is correct, and it seems to me, speaking generally, that at least the Colony could do with not more magistrates than districts; with, at most, the same number, if not less, because I cannot imagine that there should be more than a full day's work in ench district every day; I should have thought, in fact, that it would not be necessary, even if you did not amalgamate the districts, for each district to have a court every day, and. therefore, you might do with fewer magistraten.
13,184. One magistrate could go to two courts in two adjoining districts P-Yes, or possibly two might do three districts, or some arrangement of that kind.
13,185. Do you know anything about the necessity for three magistrates in Port Louis -No, I do not.
13.186. (Mr. Woodcock.) In English towrs three times the size of Port Louis, there is one magistrate who does the whole thing ?-Yes, I could only speak in general on that point. Of course the number of nugistrates in colonies is greater, in proportion to the population, than it is at home; I think that was so in British Guiana.
13.187. (Chairman.) But this is not at all a large town. Why should they have so many magistratus here? In Singapore they have got 200,000 people in the town and it is a very much more go-ahead place than this, with an immense number of foreigners and an enormous amount of shipping which gives a great deal of work to the magistrate, and I am sure there are not more than four there ?-No. it certainly see ma absurd that three should be required, but, of course, I do not know very much about it. If I were shown a return by which it appeared that they all eat for a full day, of course I should be prepared to say that there was enough work for them. It seems to me myself that it should not be so, because granting that the town is of a certain size, so many of the people go away in the afternoon, and it is not a town where there is much life in the evening, which often gives rise to a good deal of police work.
13.168. (Mr. Woodcock.) And there is not much drunkenness in the Island P-No, from what one cheerves from going about, there does not appear to be much drunkenness in the Island.
13,189. (Chairman.) What about appeals coming from magistrates; are there a great many ?-No, there are not. I was looking to-day at the cause list to see how many cases of each kind we had in this last cause list, and it struck me how few appeals there
were.
(Mr. Woodcock.) What is your view about the way in which these magistrates do their work, sitting as an appellate judge
(Chairman.) I see there were 28 cases, 2 reverses, 11 modified, and 15 in which the judgment was upheld.
13,190. (Mr. Woodcock.) Of course that is not quite a test of the way in which they do their work, because a man may get his decision reversed and yet he may feel it in quite good decision on the lines he has gone on. What is your view as to them; do they seem to be competent all round-Yes, I was going to say that that fact alone, that there are not a great many appeals, because I do not think there are, speaks fairly well for them, because this Colony is different from many where the districts are wide and scattered, and the lawyers cannot get to the courts easily. The courts here are over-run, if I may say so, with lawyers, and it seems to me that in any case where there was likely to be a chance of an appeal we should get an appeal, so that I think the fact that there are not many speaks fairly well for the magistrates.
But I may
ay that scmetimes we get casos which show that the
23 July 1909.]
MINUTES OF EVIDENCE.
Mr. Justice DAVSON.
magistrate has not taken sufficient care, but I do not think there is an undue proportion of such cases.
13,191. (Chairman.) Do you know anything about the work of the master of the court-I am afraid I do not; I mean, as long as the court work goes smoothly. I am not in touch with the actual work. There is only one small point, if I may mention it. In my answer to the first of those "C" questions; the question is Were they at work to-day "P-As regards the officers 1 only answered as regards my clerk, who is the immediate officer under me, and I took "to-day " there as being the day on which I made my return, anyhow. it was not a Saturday. It occurred to me afterwards that the date intended was the date of the covering letter, which was a Saturday.
13.192. (Mr. Woodcock.) The date was a fixed date P -It occurred to me that the Commissioners wanted to know whether he worked on Saturday.
47
[Continued.
13,193. (Chairman.) He worked there on Saturday? -No, the judges do not go down on Saturday, and one's clerk does not go either.
13,194. Do none of the court staff go ?—The officers in the registry go, but the judges do not go and their clerks do not go, unless for ar Assize case; in order to finish an Assize casė one would wit on Saturday.
18,195. (Mr. Woodcock.) But is there no other work that the judges' clerks could do on a Saturday? it seems such a pity to waste the whole of a half day ?-Of course, as I have said, he could do clerical work on any day, and there is no reason, I suppose, why he should not do such work on a Saturday.
-Yes,
13,196. The practice has arisen that he does not ?
13,197. (Chairman). There does not seem to be any work for him to do ?—I do not think there is.
The witness withdrew,
Adjourned for a short time.
(10.)
REPLIES of the Hon. Major-General A. G. ÛREAGH, C.B., to Written Questions.
A. 1. To the system of Government.
There are ten elected members in the Legislative Council. The total electorate is 6,555 (Blue Book, 1907), - out of a population of 370,000. The Mauritians are a people peculiarly unfitted to have a voice in the Govern ment of a country. Their ideas of truth, honour and justice are not ours. They seem to have little sense of public duty and their vanity is beyond belief. Five of the unofficial members are lawyers, who find the making of long speeches in the Council Chamber is good practice, and an excellent advertisement, as they are reported in the local papers, and their names thus kept before the public. Meanwhile the official members, many of whom are hard-worked men in the charge of departments, have to sit and listen. Unfortunately the best class of Mauritians seem to hold aloof from local politics, and take little or no part in the Government of the Island.
Almost everything in the Colony is badly managed, because the Legislative Council insists on meddling with the various departments, the tendency being to remove all power from the responsible heads, making it dificult for them to maintain discipline amongst their subordinates or even to get rid of the dishonest and inefficient. Indeed the sympathy with criminals in general shown by the elected members is quite remarkable.
I understand that previous to 1885, when the present Constitution was granted, the Colony always had a considerable surplus of income over expenditure, and kept a substantial reserve fund to meet emergencies. The Legislative Council, however, began at once to increase the Civil Service by the creation of a vast number of badly paid posts, so that the expenses mounted rapidly, whilst little or nothing was done to augment the revenue. Moreover, they never hesitated to draw upon the reserve fund when there was a bad year. A financial crisis was therefore bound to cocur sooner or later.
The following are, in my opinion, contributory causes placed in order of importance :-*
(i) Lack of business aptitude, energy and enterprise on the part of the inhabitants, who seem always quite content as long as they can borrow.
(ii) Malaria.
(iii) The preposterous quarantine regulations. These are so harassing that no ships will call at Port Louis
if they can avoid it. Thus trade is hampered.
(iv) Plague.
4. 2. You, to a very great extent.
(i) The elective element in the Legislative Council should be abolished. No considerable improvement can be expected while it exists. A Governor cannot well make everything a Government measure, and carry it through by the weight of his official majority.
(ii) A very great improvement in the general health may be expected if the measures recommended by Major Roes are carried out. The draining of the Phonix and Clairfond Marshes, for example, has resulted in an enormous decrease in the incidence of malaria amongst the surrounding population.
(iii) The expenses due to plague are very heavy. Whether they are really necessary or not is a medical question. I have my doubts, but I scarcely like to express an opinion.
(iv) Compulsory vaccination and re-vaccination should be introduced, and the quarantine rules brought into conformity with those of civilised countries. The benefit to be derived from this latter menstre would be twofold Shipping would no longer be deterred from visiting the Island, and a great reduction sculd be made in the quarantine staff.
() All the heads of departments, their understudies, the judges and a far larger proportion of the magis trates should be Englishmen. The small French community have been intermarrying for so many years that they are almost all connected or related, and it is very difficult for a man born and bred in Mauritius to be impartial.
(vi) There should be a greater number of English professors and instructors at the Royal College, and an earnest attempt should be make to bring the boys there up to a higher standard of truth and honour.
(vii) Many of the subordinate posts under Government should be abolished, and the pay of the remainder increased. The officials would then have an incentive to do all in their power to retain their appointments, and the temptation to peculation and fraud onused by extreme poverty would be removed.
(viii) Young Mauritians of the professional classes, on completing their studies, should be encouraged to seek their fortunes in any of the other Colonies or in India. They are, as a rule, very intelligent, and once away from home infiuenos, they would have a chance of developing some independence of character, and becoming useful members of society. Some in fact have done so, but the great majority cannot bear the idea of a long absence from their native land.