CO129-382 - Public Offices - 1911 — Page 27

5.

26

Chatham, who had arrived home in July, did not know of the

contract which had been entered into; or that possibly it was

not entered into until after the indent was despatched to us.

In that case it would have been an ordinary precaution on the

part of the Goverment, before committing themselves to a local

contractor, to ascertain by telegram from us about what date the

steel work might be expected. We submit that the difficulty

of the Hong Kong Gove mment has been due to the omission of its

officers in that, if a local contract had been entered into before

the despatch of the indent, they did not inform us; or that, if

the contract was made later, they omitted first to ascertain from

us when the steelwork would arrive,

8. Mr.Waring'sexplanation, dated the 10th November 1909, of

the length of time taken in preparing the drawings and specifica-

tions on which tenders were obtained, is already before the Gov-

ernor

As the despatch makes no reference to this matter we

have not here gone further into it. I may however observe that

work of this class will in future for the most part be undertaken

by the drawing office which we have recently established; and it

is our practice, directly we find that the preparation of plans

and documents is likely to take any considerable time, at once to

tell the Colonial Goverment as fully as posside what is being

done.

9. In the second paragraph of his despatch the Governor complains that "Mr. Chathen's views and statements were not accurate- "ly represented by Mr. Waring, who would seen to have endeavoured "to shift the responsibility for delay on to Mr. Chatham's shoulders. So far as we can make out, this charge is based upon a passage in

r. Waring's letter of the 25th October to Mr. Chatham, which con-

veys