CO129-421 - Governor Sir May - 1915 [3-4] — Page 261

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office here was paying for its own mails. The Hongkong General Post Office would also lose its share of the transit dues. The working arrangement of the lie therlands India Agency in Singapore to which the representatives of the Chinese Post Office referred states that all mails closed by the Dutch Agent at Singapore other than those for despatch by homeward bound mail steamers for Europe are handed to the Straits Post Office for shipment. This procedure the Chinese Post Office appeared disinclined to adopt, preferring that its Agency should ship Chinese mails direct to its own and to all Contract Mail Steamers in Hongkong harbour entire- -ly ignoring the General Post Office here. In any case it would not have been possible to concede the shipping of any mail direct here, as the Dutch Agency is permitted to do in Singapore because the interests of the British Postal Agencies had to be considered and any such facilities would practically have penalized the Agencies owing to the fact that they have to pay transit dues from Hongkong onward, whereas the Chinese Post Office would have es- -caped paying such dues. It may be stated that it has been the

policy of the Chinese Post Office to ignore the British Postal Agencies whenever opportunity has offered in the past and to deny the Agencies reciprocal treatment in cases where the British Postal Agencies are called upon to make concession to the Chinese Post Office. The enclosed memorandum on the subject of the

Chinese Contract steamers bears out this atatement.

4.

The question as to whether the so-called

Chinese contract steamers may really be considered as subsidized steamers and treated as such in the waters of this Colony, was submitted to the Secretary, General Post Office, who in a lengthy reply o. 179696/14 dated 30th. December, 1914, made it quite clear that these steamers are "Compagnies libres" i.e. entitled to enter into agreements with different Postal Authorities; and that the Hongkong Post Office is "at liberty to make its own arrangements with the steamship companies for the conveyance of

mails

nelosure

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