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13020.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

wwwimmimC.O. 885

11 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC- COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH—NOT TO

MY LORD,

No. 877.

(STRAITS SETTLEMENTS.)

LAW OFFICERS to COLONIAL OFFICE.

We are honoured with your Lordship's commands signified in Mr. Robert W.

Temple, December 5, 1873. Herbert's letter of the 20th ultimo, stating that he was directed by your Lordship to request our opinion on the following point, respecting the incidence of an annual sum of 8001., being part of the pension now payable to Sir Benson Maxwell, formerly Recorder Judge, first of Prince of Wales Island (commonly known as Penang), and subsequently of Singapore, and latterly, to the date of his retirement, Chief Justice of the Straits Settlements.

The Imperial Act, 6 Geo. IV. c. 85., empowered the King to assign by Sign Manual from the revenues of India a pension at certain specified rates to the Recorder Judge of Prince of Wales Island, then part of the territories of the East India Company. The Act 18 & 19 Vict. c. 93., applied the above-mentioned provisions of the Act of George IV. to the Recorder Judge of Singapore, and declared that residence partly as one and partly as the other of such Recorders should be reckoned as if such residence had been wholly in the same capacity.

Sir Peter Benson Maxwell was appointed Recorder Judge of Penang (Prince of Wales Island) in January 1856, and was transferred to be Recorder Judge of Singa- pore on the 20th of July 1866, and served in that capacity until the 1st April 1867, when the Straits Settlements ceased to be part of India (within the meaning of 21 & 22 Vict. c. 106.) by virtue of an Order made by Her Majesty in Council on the 28th of December 1866, issued under the powers conferred by the Imperial Act, 29 & 30 Viot. c. 115.

That Act (section 4) provided that until otherwise provided "all laws" (except 21 & 22 Vict. c. 106.) "which when this Act shall come into operation shall be in "force in the said Settlements

shall be and continue to be of the same force " and effect as if this Act had not been passed" (thus keeping alive the Act 18 & 19 Vict. c. 93.) and further empowered Her Majesty (section 1) to make provision in the Order in Council bringing it into operation "respecting the enforcement by or against the Government of the said Settlements of all or any of such debts, claims, "and obligations as might if this Act had not passed have been enforced by or against the Government of India in connexion with the administration of the " said Settlements."

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It was to be observed that in Her Majesty's Order in Council (copy annexed) no provision was made for the transfer of the obligation of Sir B. Maxwell's pension nor any other obligation.

In May 1871 Sir B. Maxwell, who had since the transfer continued to be Chief Justice of the Straits Settlements, applied to retire upon a pension of 8001., to be paid from Indian funds under the 18 & 19 Vict. c. 93., in addition to a pension afterwards fixed at 4501. in respect of his service subsequent to the transfer, from Colonial funds under Local Ordinance No. 9 of 1870.

This claim was admitted by the India Office on behalf of India, as would be seen from the enclosed letter from the India Office of the 13th of June 1871.

It had also been previously admitted as a prospective liability by that office in 1868; and in January 1872 that office, adverting to correspondence between the Governments of India and of the Straits Settlements (copies enclosed) in which the Government of India had repudiated the claim, observed that the Indian Government appeared to have "been imperfectly informed of the facts of the case."

India Omer, 7 March 1873, To India Office,

To Governor. Governor 195,

11

12h 1873, arch 1878. July 1873.

18ept. 1873. 16 Bept. 1873.

25 August 1879. To8irB.Maxwè||.

The pension of 8007. has since continued to be paid from Indian funds, but in March of this year the India Office raised the question whether the whole of Sir B. Maxwell's pension ought not properly to fall on Straits funds, and that suggestion had given rise to the enclosed correspondence noted in the margin on which our opinion is desired. Bir B. Maxwell.

It would be seen that the India Office rely on a report by Sir Hercules Robinson, dated 25th of January 1864, in which he suggested (paragraph 44) that the burden of that pension should be transferred by Act of Parliament from India to the Straits (page 15), a recommendation which he recapitulated in a subsoquent part of his report

U 16278.-857. 25.-5/86.

Sir B. Maxwell,

To India Office,

24

India Once,

1

Sept. 1873. October 1873.

p.15 of P.P. 1886,

2