CO129-363 - Public Offices & Others - 1909 — Page 453

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20079

China Association,

Peco

c 16 JUN 09

159, CANNON Street,

LONDON, E.C. 16th June, 1909. 19

The approaching expiry, on the 10th October next, of the during period which the British Post Office at Tientsin is being main- tained under the joint arrangement between the Lords Commiss- ioners of the Treasury and the Tientsin Municipalities reminds my Committee that the question remains, so far as their knowledge goes,

in the unsettled position in which it was left in the autumn of last year.

In August 1908, Sir Frederick Lugard informed the Municipal Councils that the offer of the Lords Commissioners to bear half the estimated loss of the Agency was expressly made in order to provide for its temporary retention pending further consider- ation; and it was on this understanding that the Municipalities undertook the responsibility.

The commercial depression and financial losses experienced lately at Tientsin, render it improbable that they would agree to renew the undertaking.

The Association desires again, in presence of this uncertainty, to repeat the expression of its conviction that, while other Powers with smaller interests in China maintain a Post Office in Tientsin, Great Britain cannot, for the sake of the trivial sum involved in its maintenance, submit to the loss of prestige the closing of the office would necessarily entail.

H.M. Under Secretary of State

for the Colonies,

Downing Street,

S.W.