Enclosure
C. O.
222817
Rec
(Red 26 DEC 34)
HONGKONG, 21st November, 1894.
MY LORD MARQUESS,
It is with deep disappointment that we have recently learned that Your Lordship feels unable, with the information at present before you, to make the same offer, as regards exchange compensation, to the Civil Servants in Hongkong as has been made to the Civil Servants in the Straits Settlements.
2. In the Despatch in which exchange compensation was first offered to us it was stated that Your Lordship was prepared to sanction the same course for Hongkong as for the Straits Settlements, and under precisely the same limitations.
3. The reasons which compelled the Straits Service to press for better terms than those originally suggested, and now again offered to us, are already so well known to Your Lordship that it is unnecessary for us to recapitulate them. We would therefore merely impress upon Your Lordship the fact of their intensified application to this Colony, owing, inter alia, to its greater distance from the Mother country and to the higher cost of house rent.
4. We feel confident that Your Lordship would be most unwilling to withhold from us the offer made to the Civil Service of the Straits Settlements unless you had formed the opinion that the financial condition of Hongkong was such as to render it impracticable. This opinion we confidently hope Your Lordship will, by the light of further information as regards our finances, feel yourself able to modify.
5. With regard to the offer at present made to us, we cannot but feel that any proposal by which (without raising local exchange compensation considerably above 3/-) our leave salaries are reduced by anything approaching 25% is open to the objection taken by Lord KNUTSFORD in his Despatch No. 119 of 1899. His Lordship there remarks (para. 6)—"I allowed the 4/- rate to remain in force for purposes of leave salaries, as I considered that to fix leave pay at 3/8 to the dollar 'would have put an undue strain on the resources of Civil Servants requiring to take leave on half salary, the consequence being, perhaps, to make it difficult for them to avail themselves of the proper amount of leave when necessary for their health and efficiency."—At the time of writing this Despatch, the gold value of the dollar was 3/5).
6. It seems evident that any scheme which tends to seriously reduce Officers' leave pay (at present, we submit, barely sufficient for their support in England), unless counterbalanced by a more generous rate of local compensation than that now proposed, must, as Lord KNUTSFORD apprehended, render it difficult for them to take the leave which it is desirable that they should enjoy.
The Right Honourable
THE MARQUESS OF RIPON,
Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State
for the Colonies,
&c.
&c.
Enclosure
C. O.
222817
Rec
(Red 26 DEC 34)
HONGKONG, 21st November, 1894.
MY LORD MARQUESS,
It is with deep disappointment that we have recently learned that Your Lordship feels unable, with the information at present before you, to make the same offer, as regards exchange compensation, to the Civil Servants in Hongkong as has been made to the Civil Servants in the Straits Settlements.
2. In the Despatch in which exchange compensation was first offered to us it was stated that Your Lordship was prepared to sanction the same course for Hongkong as for the Straits Settlements, and under precisely the same limitations.
3. The reasons which compelled the Straits Service to press for better terms than those originally suggested, and now again offered to us, are already so well known to Your Lordship that it is unnecessary for us to recapitulate them. We would therefore merely impress upon Your Lordship the fact of their intensified application to this Colony, owing, inter alia, to its greater distance from the Mother country and to the higher cost of house rent.
4. We feel confident that Your Lordship would be most unwilling to with- hold from us the offer made to the Civil Service of the Straits Settlements unless
yon
bad formed the opinion that the financial condition of Hongkong was such as to render it impracticable. This opinion we confidently hope Your Lordship will, by the light of further information as regards our finances, feel yourself able to modity.
5. With regard to the offer at present made to us, we cannot but feel that any proposal by which (without raising local exchange compensation considerably above 3/-) our leave salaries are reduced by anything approaching 25 % is open to the objection taken by Lord KNUTSFORD in his Despatch No. 119 of 1899. His Lordship there remarks (para. 6)-"I allowed the 4/- rate to remain in force for purposes of leave salaries, as I considered that to fix leave pay at 3/8 to the dollar "would have put an undue strain on the resources of Civil Servants requiring to "take leave on half salary, the consequence being, perhaps, to make it difficult for "them to avail themselves of the proper amount of leave when necessary for their health and efficiency."—At the time of writing this Despatch, the gold value of the dollar was 3/5).
6. It seems evident that any scheme which teuds to seriously reduce Officers leave pay (at present, we subuit, barely sufficient for their support in England), unless counterbalanced by a more generous rate of local compensation than that now proposed, must, as Lord KxuTSFORD apprehended, render it difficult for them to take the leave which it is desirable that they should enjoy.
The Right Honourable
THE MARQUESS OF RIPON,
Her Majesty's Principal Secretary of State
for the Colonics,
Sr.,
&c.
$.c.
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