47122
R
SIR,
(No. 170.)
(AUSTRALIA : New South Wales—NORFOLK ISLAND.),
LAW OFFICERS TO COLONIAL OFFICE.
[Future Administration of Norfolk Island.]
Royal Courts of Justice, 13th November, 1902. We were honoured with your commands signified in Mr. H. Bertram Cox's letter of the 11th October last stating that he was directed by you to lay before us a despatch (No. 102 of 14th August) from the Governor of New South Wales, and also a copy of a telegram of 20th August from the Acting Governor-General of the Commonwealth of Australia, and to request the favour of our Report upon the proposals therein contained as to the future administration of Norfolk Island.
That he was to remind us that the question as to the legal means by which Norfolk Island could be annexed to the Colony of New South Wales was submitted to our predecessors in office, in 1896, and that he was to enclose copies of their Reports dated the 31st October and 10th December in that year.*
That from the former of those Reports it would appear that the obstacles in the way of annexing Norfolk Island to New South Wales by Order in Council under the Colonial Boundaries Act, 1895, were (1) the provisions of section 5 of 18 and 19 Vict. c. 56, and (2) the provisions of section 46 of the Bill scheduled to 18 and 19 Vict. c. 54 which placed the boundaries of New South Wales upon a statutory basis so as to prevent their being altered by Order in Council even with the consent of the Colony,
That he was to point out that in the case of the present proposal to annex Norfolk Island to the Commonwealth of Australia the second of the above mentioned obstacles would appear to have been removed by the enactment of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900, and that it would further appear from the Report of our predecessors in office of the 10th December, 1896, that the provisions of section 46 of the Bill scheduled to 18 and 19 Vict. c. 54 was the chief of the two obstacles referred to.
That if this was the case it would, unless 18 and 19 Vict. c. 56 section 5 was per se a fatal objection to the course proposed, appear possible, in view of section 8 of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act, 1900, and section 122 of the Constitution scheduled thereto, to annex Norfolk Island to the Commonwealth by Order in Council under the Colonial Boundaries Act, 1895.
That Mr. Bertram Cox was accordingly to request us to take the papers into our consideration, and to report :-
1. Whether Norfolk Island could be annexed to the Commonwealth of Australia without an Imperial Act of Parliament ?
2. If so, whether the aunexation should be effected by Order in Council under the Colonial Boundaries Act, 1895, or how otherwise?
3. Whether such an Order in Council should make provision under 18 and 19 Viet.
e. 56, sections 4 and 5, for the interim Government of Norfolk Island pending legislation
on that subject by the Commonwealth ?
4. If annexation without an Imperial Act of Parliament was impossible, whether there were any and, if so, what objections to transferring the administration of Norfolk Island from the Government of New South Wales to the Government of the Common- wealth by revoking the Orier in Council of the 15th January, 1897, and substituting for it an Order in Council placing the Island under the authority of the Commonwealth, under the provisions of section 122 of the Constitution ?
5. Generally.
We have taken the papers into our consideration, and in obedience to your commands, have the honour to
Report-
1. That in our opinion Norfolk Island can be annexed to the Commonwealth of
Australia by Order in Council without an Imperial Act of Parliament. There is no
Nos. 119 and 123 in Vol. V
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