PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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C.O. 885/
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO
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No. 31.
EXTRACT from REPORT of the BRITISH DELEGATES to the THIRD CONGRESS of the UNIVERSAL POSTAL UNION, held at Lisbon, dated 21st April 1885.
The subjects upon which we received instructions before proceeding to Lisbon are dealt with in the accompanying Minutes. The most important of these subjects was the proposal of Germany to reduce the transit rate payable by one country to another for the enveyance of correspondence by sea, and to curtail at the same time the postage rates leviable from the public on account of sea transit.
We are glad to be able to report that, although an overwhelming majority could have been obtained in favour of these measures, the representations made on behalf of Great Britain prevailed so as to gain the maintenance of the status quố in both respects. No reduction of transit rates has been voted; and the option to levy certain surtaxes for sea carriage and special services, over and above the fundamental Union rates of postage, remains undisturbed, except as regards a surtax of 10 centimes (1d.) which it was permissible to levy upon letters incurring the sea transit rate of five francs per kilogramme. This surtax was suppressed, mainly on the ground that its admission in the first instance was only a measure of transition, and that it is in fact imposed in very few instances. Great Britain, at all events, does not impose it; and, so far as the decisions of the Congress are concerned, our rates can remain unchanged.
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The foregoing are the principal points connected with rates of postage and transit payments; but we must not conceal from you that the question of wholly abolishing payments for transit services by land and sea, and of enforcing throughout the Union the adoption of uniform rates of postage irrespective of the service performed, was frequently and openly discussed. This view has powerful opponents, but it has also powerful and numerous adherents; and it is highly probable that a strong attempt will be made to bring it into effect at the next Congress, to be held in 1891.
In the mean- time it is satisfactory to know that the firm opposition of a very small minority can be made to tell in the affairs of the Union so as to withstand modifications involving large amounts. The threatened abolition of transit rates and surtaxes would, if carried out, have subjected this country to a loss of 70,000l. a year, calculated on the present figures; and the necessity of incurring this loss, together with several others which might have been incurred under other heads, and which, though not easy to estimate, must have amounted to many thousands a year, has been warded off, at all events for seven years.
The question of revising, in a sense favourable to the British Empire, the distribution of votes in the affairs of the Union, was debated at great length, and was found to be a most thorny topic, the French delegates going so far as to declare that if our demands were conceded they also would demand additional representation for the French Colonies. You are aware that, besides the vote which the United Kingdom exercises, British India and the Dominion of Canada have each a separate vote, while Great Britain has not hitherto enjoyed any additional vote for the Colonies collectively, such as other countries exercise for colonies of much less importance than ours. The reason of this state of things is that the Congress of Paris (1878) refused to award a vote for Canada and a vote for the rest of the Colonies, but on awarding a single collective vote consented to its being ceded to Canada. But, upon fresh representations and under new circumstances, the Lisbon Congress has decided to concede to the United Kingdom an additional vote for the whole of the unrepresented Colonies, including any outside Australasia which may yet enter the Union, and conditionally upon the entry of the Cape Colony and Natal. It was also, as you are already aware, decided to award to the Australasian Colonies a single collective vote in the event of the adhesion of not less than three of them to the Convention.
Having regard to the extreme jealousy manifested at the Congress by other great powers on the subject of the equilibrium of the Union, we regard this result as satisfac- tory. It tends, in our opinion, to insure a proper influence to the British Empire as a whole, in the event of the completion of the Union, as desired, by the entry of the remaining large Colonies of Great Britain; and we recommend that continued efforts should be made towards the entry of the Australian and South African Colonies upon the terms now offered, especially as they would enter with the express guarantee that no change will be made in the transit rates and surtaxes until after the next quinquen- nial Congress a guarantee which, moreover, is applied in the general decisions of the Congress of Lisbon on the subject of transit rates and surtaxes. Our experiences at
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Lisbon tend to convince us that the completion of the Postal Union will be a work of real benefit to civilisation. The Union exists for the uses of peace and commercial development; and its completion will probably increase the facilities for reconciling difficulties and "
jarring claims" in one department, at least, of the commerce of mankind. The entry of Siam, declared at the Congress, indicates how wide an attrac- tiveness the Union already has. The adherence of Boliva reproaches us from the other side of the Atlantic, inasmuch as that adherence only was wanted for the whole continent of America to become associated by means of a convention-common to all the nations of the Old World;-so that, in the commonwealth of modern civilisation, there are but our two great groups of quasi-independent Colonies holding back; and we cannot but believe that, apart from questions immediately affecting postal revenues, those Colonies, in common with the Empire as a whole, would find their account in abandoning their attitude of isolation among civilised communities.
No. 32.
TEXT of LETTER from the GOVERNMENT of NATAL to the COLONIAL OFFICE, dated 23rd January 1886.
With reference to Sir Henry Bulwer's Despatch, No. 63 of the 6th of May last, I have the honour to inform you that the Postmaster-General of this Colony (Mr. Chadwick) having returned to duty from leave of absence in England, and having reported to this Government on the question of the advisability of entering the Postal Union, it has been decided, after consideration of his report, not to enter the Union at present.
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