CO885-5 — Page 147

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

Reference :-

C.O. 885

5 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

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

SIR,

12223

No. 7.

WAR OFFICE to COLONIAL OFFICE.

War Office, Pall Mall, February 5, 1886.

I HAVE received and laid before the Secretary of State for War your letter of 4th instant, giving cover to a copy of the report of the Committee appointed to consider the conditions upon which naval and military officers should be allowed to take service under Colonial Governments. In reply I am to state, for the information of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, that the Secretary of State for War concurs in the recommendations of the Committee, and in the proposal to submit the report for the consideration of the Treasury.

SIR,

The Under Secretary of State,

Colonial Office.

No. 8.

I have, &c.,

(Signed)

RALPH THOMPSON.

COLONIAL OFFICE to TREASURY+

Downing Street, February 5, 1886.

I AM directed by Colonel Stanley to transmit to you, to be laid before the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury, a copy of the report of a committee consisting of representatives of the War Office, Admiralty, and Colonial Office, which was recently appointed to further consider the conditions under which naval and military officers may be allowed to take service in the naval or military forces of the Colonies.

2. Colonel Stanley having seen the report of the Departmental Committee appointed by the Treasury Minute of December 19, 1884, and the other documents mentioned in the fourth paragraph of the enclosed report, observed that the employment of officers on the active list remained to be considered, and after communicating with Mr. Secretary Smith and Lord George Hamilton, he agreed with them that a matter involving so much detail could not conveniently be dealt with by correspondence, and that an agreement would be more easily obtained through an Inter-Departmental Committee, which also would be able to enter into personal discussion with the Agents-General for the Colonies, who had been in correspondence with this Department upon the subject.

3. It was at first proposed to invite the Treasury to add a representative to the Committee, but it was afterwards considered that it might be convenient for the three other Departments to hold an inquiry and submit their recommendations in a completed shape for the consideration of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury. Accordingly the letter of the 29th of January,§ of which a copy is now enclosed, was not sent to you; but I am to explain that the paragraph in that letter relating to officers drawing superannuation allowances in respect of civil service had been inserted in view of the possibility of an officer from your Department forming one of tlie Committee. A further letter will probably be addressed to you on that subject.

4. Colonel Stanley approves of the recommendations of the enclosed report, to which he attaches much importance, and it will be seen from the accompanying letters that they have also received the formal approval of the Lords Commissioners, of the Admiralty and the Secretary of State for War; and I am to request that they may receive the attention and, as it is believed that they deserve, the favourable consideration of the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury.

5. The Colonies will without doubt wish to make their naval and military forces as efficient as possible. Such efficiency is manifestly to the advantage of Her Majesty's Government, and, as these forces become numerically stronger, following the increased growth of Colonial population and wealth, it will become from year to year more important that Her Majesty's Government should acquire the certainty that such efficiency exists and is maintained, and that these forces do form a real addition to the strength of the Empire upon which reliance may be placed in time of trouble.

• No. 5.

Copy of this letter without enclosures sent to the Admiralty and War Office, 8th February.

‡ No. 4.

No. 3.

Nos. 6 and 7.

23

6. Such efficiency will necessarily depend in great measure upon the excellence or otherwise of the different officers in command, or on the staff of the naval and military forces of the various Colonies, and Colonel Stanley entirely concurs in the view taken by the Committee as to the necessity of supplying such officers as far as possible from the active list of the two services, who should be lent for a few years and then return to their position in the home service or be liable to be recalled to their ordinary duty should they in any case fail to prove themselves well fitted for their work in the Colony.

7. It appears to him reasonable to place naval officers-in all respects on the same footing as army officers in respect to the terms on which they would be lent to a Colony. Such a step may prevent friction in the Colony, and as the proposal to allow naval officers to count Colonial service as sea time is coupled with the proposal that the Colonies shall provide the whole remuneration of such officers, a change which will result in the immediate saving to the Exchequer of the half-pay drawn under present regula- tions, Colonel Stanley hopes that these proposals will meet with their Lordships' approval.

8. The further proposal that military officers from the active list, who retire from the army while in Colonial military employ, shall not receive, while holding any such employment, that portion of his retired pay which he has earned by Colonial service, appears reasonable, and Colonel Stanley observes that this amounts to a modification of Rule 991 of the Army Warrant so far as to suspend, instead of entirely withdrawing, this portion of the retired pay of an oflicer who wishes, while holding Colonial employ- ment, to draw his retired pay earned in purely army service.

9. With reference to the 14th paragraph of the enclosed report, I am to state that a separate letter will be addressed to you.

10. I am to add that as the enclosures to the report No. 1-6 are already records of your Department, copies are not sent herewith, but a copy of No. 7, which is a letter from the Admiralty to War Office, is enclosed.

The Secretary to the Treasury.

Sir,

I

am, &c.,

(Signed)

ROBERT G. W. HERBERT.

No. 9.

COLONIAL OFFICE to TREASURY.

Downing Street, February 15, 1886. REFERRING to the 9th paragraph of the letter from this Department of the 5th instant,* transmitting the report of the Committee upon the employment of naval and military officers in the Colonies, and to the 14th paragraph of that report, I am directed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to ask that he may receive some fuller information respecting the last sentence but one of the Treasury Minute of the 25th of September 1885, which states " these rules will not apply to

* salaries paid out of the revenues *

* of Colonies which receive no contributions from Imperial funds."

**

*

2. Two questions appear to be raised by the sentence above quoted. (a.) Is it intended that the rules which, as framed, relate to the hotne service, should apply to Colonies which do receive contributions from Imperial funds, and in that case, how is the deduction of one-tenth of the Colonial salary to he enforced?

(b.) What is the nature of the contributions which would bring a Colony within the above rules; for it is apprehended that Western Australia, in which the Governor is paid a portion of his salary from the Exchequer, would not be included, seeing that the money is paid to him direct, and does not pass

> through the Colonial accounts?

3. I am to suggest that if their Lordships woutd refer to the estimates for 1885-86, and would favour the Secretary of State with their views upon the above two questions in respect to each of the Colonies mentioned in Class V., subheads five and six, there will be no doubt as to what the sentence above quoted is meant to convey.

4. I am at the same time to refer to the third paragraph of the letter from this Department of the 5th instant, and to the 11th paragraph of the report enclosed in it, and to state that Lord Granville observes from the 4th and 5th paragraphs of the Treasury Minute of 25th September 1885, that if an officer who draws from Imperial funds a

Enclosure 2 in No. 4.

+ No. 8.

C 4