CO885-(13-15) — Page 406

5033.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

C.O.

Reference :-

No. 81.

(STRAITS SETTLEMENTS.)

LAW OFFICERS to COLONIAL OFFICE.

MY LORD,

WE were honoured with your Lordship's commands signified in Mr. Wingfield's

Royal Courts of Justice, March 20, 1895. letter of the 12th instant stating that he was directed by your Lordship to ask for our opinion upon a question respecting the pension claims, under the laws of the Straits Settlements, of Mr. Isemonger, an officer in the public service of that Colony, and Mr. Irving, a former officer in that service who had retired on pension.

That Mr. Wingfield was to enclose copies of the following Ordinances of the Straits Settlements, viz.:—

No. 9 of 1870. The Pensions Ordinance, 1870.”

No. 1 of 1871.-" The Pensions Ordinance, 1871."

No. 8 of 1887. "The Pensions Ordinance, 1887," (with Regulations made under it.) No. 1 of 1888.- "The General Clauses Ordinance, 1888."

No. 15 of 1888.—“ An Ordinance to amend the Pensions Ordinance, 1887."

That by the Pensions Ordinance, 1870, section 20, it was provided that any public officer who had been transferred by the Secretary of State from the Imperial Civil Service, or the Civil Service of any Colony, to that of the Straits Settlements might receive a pension under that Ordinance subject to certain rules set forth in that section. That by the Pensions Ordinance, 1871, the Pensions Ordinance, 1870, was repealed (except sections 21 and 22), but that all its repealed provisions, except sections 20 and 24 (the short title clause) were substantially re-enacted. That that Ordinance contained no provision specifically applying to officers transferred from the Imperial service.

That by the Pensions Ordinance, 1887, the Pensions Ordinance, 1871, was repealed, but that it was declared that such repeal should not affect " any right, privilege,

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obligation, or liability acquired, accrued, or incurred under the said Ordinance," and should not apply to any officer in the public service of the Colony at the date of its passing who did not, within six months after that date, give notice in writing to the Colonial Secretary of his wish to come within its provisions, and who should hold at the date of his retirement from such service the same office which he held at the date of its passing; but every such officer's claim to pension should be dealt with as though it had not been passed.

That the Regulations made under that Ordinance provided for the manner of computing the pensions of officers who had been transferred from the service of the Crown elsewhere to the service of the Colony.

That each of those three Pensions Ordinances contained a section providing that no public officer should be held to have an absolute right to any pension under the Ordinance.

That by Ordinance 15 of 1889 the provisions of the Pensions Ordinance, 1887, which qualified the repeal of the Pensions Ordinance, 1871, were repealed ab initio.

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That by section 4 of the General Clauses Ordinance, 1888, it was enacted (sub-section 3) that "whenever any written law repeals either in whole or in part a former written law such repeal shall not, in the absence of any express provision to the contrary, affect or be deemed to have affected

acquired * (sub-section 4) that that section should apply to written laws made as well before as under the repealed written law," and any right after the commencement of the Ordinance.

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That Mr. Isemonger was in the service of the Straits Settlements at the date of the passing of the Pensions Ordinance, 1870, and had been transferred to that service from the Imperial Civil Service; that he had raised the question whether, on his retirement, he could claim to have a pension computed according to the Rules set forth in section 20 of the Pensions Ordinance. 1870. That a pension so computed would be of greater amount than a pension computed under the provisions of either the Pensions Ordinance, 1871, or the Pensions Ordinance, 1887.

0 85965.--6.

25.--4 95.

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14 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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