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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
Reference :-
C.O. 88,5
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PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON
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It will have been gathered from the preceding sections of the "Vereins Zollgesetz (Union Customs Law) that vessels arriving in German seaports are at present not obliged to pay duty either on the stores required for the use of the vessel and crew whilst in port or on the surplus quantity, providing the latter be at once sealed up by the Customs Authorities. With regard, moreover, to the question as to when the Customs seals may in such case be removed again by the ship-master, I am informed that (whether the ship be bound to another German or to a foreign port) no objection is made by the German Authorities to the seals having been removed, providing the removal has taken place outside the Customs district where they were affixed. In the event of the vessel sailing to another German port, after the seals may have been removed, fresh seals are placed upon the surplus stores at the latter port, provided that requisite application be made by the master.
I may perhaps observe that, in other respects, the removal or breaking of Customs seals affixed to goods by the German Customs Authorities is visited by heavy penalties.
Section 144 of the "Vereins Zollgesetz" provides that "the penalty for smuggling or defrauding the Customs shall be increased by one-half. (3) If the act of smuggling or defrauding has been accomplished by the removal of, or the breaking, or otherwise damaging of an official Customs seal," and
Section 151 provides as follows:-"The damaging of an official Customs seal, providing that such act has not been caused by any intention of thereby escaping payment of Customs duties, shall be punished by the imposition of a fine not exceeding 900 marks (457.), unless it can be proved that the Act was committed by accident."
With regard to the proposal made in the projected New German Customs Law to exempt from payment of Customs duty only ship's stores sufficient for the require- may remark that it is considered doubtful ments of the crew during two days,
at Hamburg whether such a measure will be passed by the German Parliament. Both here and in other German seaports the introduction of such a rule is seriously deprecated which, it is considered, would not only cause retaliatory measures on In the part of other countries, but would doubtless give more trouble to the Customs Authorities, as well as to all persons on board the vessel, than it would be worth. no other country are ship's stores, it appears, which are consumed whilst the vessel is in port subject to Customs duty, though the Customs arrangements as to the sealing up of surplus stores or charging duty thereon, vary.
I may, perhaps, remark finally that, in so far as concerns Hamburg and some other German ports (Bremen, Bremerhaven, Emden, &c.), where nearly the whole, or at all events a portion, of the port is by German law regarded as "free port" or "bonded territory-neither the stores nor any other goods or objects on board ships arriving in and remaining in such portions of the ports are subject to payment of Customs duties or to any Customs control or supervision.
II.
PARTICIPATION OF BRITISH SHIPS IN THE COASTING TRADE IN GERMANY.
By the Treaty of Navigation between Great Britain and Prussia of 1885, the provisions of which were in 1867 (tacitly) extended to all other States of the North German Confederation, and in 1871 to all other States of the newly-formed German Empire, the same rights (excepting those of the fisheries) were accorded to British ships as to national ships. In these rights was comprised that of participating in the Counting trade; but British Colonies and Possessions were only admitted to the enjoy ment of this last-mentioned right under the condition of reciprocity being granted by
them.
This Treaty of Navigation expired on July 30th, 1898, concurrently with the Treaty of Commerce between Great Britain and the German Zollverein; but, under a German law renewed bloquently from year to year, and finally under the German Law passed on June 11th, 1901, the most-favoured-nation rights were, and are at present, accorded to British subjects and products, excepting those of Canada (until the end of the year 1903).
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Although no special mention of "shipping" is made in this German Law, and it remains open to doubt whether British shipping has, under this law, the right of claiming "most-favoured-nation treatment" by Germany, and whether, in consequence, it would (under this law) have the right of claiming participation in the German Coasting trade, it may be observed that, in so far as concerns the latter, British shipping enjoys in Germany the same rights as German under the German Imperial Decree dated December 29th, 1881, of which a copy and translation are annexed hereto.
By an Imperial Decree dated May 22nd, 1881, of which a copy and translation are likewise annexed hereto, the right of engaging in the German Coasting trade was (apparently as a matter of principle) at first reserved exclusively to German shipping; but, by the above-mentioned decree of December 29th, 1881, the right of participation in the Coasting trade of Germany was, and still is, accorded under condition of reci- procity to the ships of Great Britain and of certain other States. (Russia and Italy enjoy the same right under subsequent treaty provisions.)
Though British vessels are thus allowed to engage in the German Coasting trade, the number employed regularly or occasionally in the German "Coasting trade"-at least as the term is interpreted according to the wording of the two German Legal Eractments annexed bereto-is very limited indeed; and, in so far as concerns the shipping visiting Hamburg (on an average 3,370 British vessels during each of the last ten years), there have, to my knowledge, not been any British vessels which" have loaded goods in one German seaport and transported the same to another German seaport in order to unload them there." There have, it is true, been about 20 to 30 British steamers every year visiting this port, which, on their voyage from and to the United Kingdom, have touched regularly or occasionally at several German seaports consecu- tively, but this trade cannot, I presume, be regarded, as “ Coasting trade" unless the conditions named in the German Law have also been fulfilled. Some British vessels, for instance, which visit Hamburg, sail from the United Kingdom with a cargo of coals for Bremen, and after discharging the coals there proceed in ballast to this port, where they then load a cargo of sugar for a British port.
British Consulate General, Hamburg,
February 8th, 1902.
Translation.
WILLIAM WARD.
The Imperial Gazette ("Reichs Gesetzblatt ").
No. 11.
No. 1,420. Law concerning the Coasting trade. May 22nd, 1881.
We, William, D.G. German Emperor, King of Prussia, &c. &c. &c., decree in the name of the Empire, after the consent of the Federal Council and of the Imperial Parliament has been obtained, as follows :—
Section 1. The right of loading goods in a German seaport and of transporting the same to another German seaport, in order to unload them there (coasting trade), belongs exclusively to German ships.
Section 2.--To foreign ships this right can be granted by State treaty or by Imperial decree with the consent of the Federal Council.
Section 3.—The master of a foreign ship who engages in the Coasting trade without being allowed to do so shall be liable to a penalty not exceeding 3,000 marks (1507.). Besides the master being sentenced to payment of a pecuniary fine, the vessel, as well as the goods illicitly transported in the same, shall be liable to confiscation, whether the same belong to the shipmaster or not. (Section 42 of the German Penal Code shall in these cases be applied.)
Section 4.-Existing treaty provisions concerning the Coasting trade shall not be affected by this law.
Section 5.—This law shall come into force on the 1st January 1882.
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.:
Given at Berlin, May 22nd, 1881.
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93495.
PRINCE VON Bismarck.
(L.B.)
Signed, &o., &c.
WILLIAM.
PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE
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