CO129-431 - Governor Sir May - 1916 [1-2] — Page 253

CO129 Colonial Office Hong Kong Records 理藩院香港檔案 All

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the cost of their transport to Australia, erection of buildings there, and their maintenance for the year will be about $250,000, or an increase of £192,000 on the Estimate and of £180,000 allow- -ing for the saving in expenditure of $12,000, The deficit to be met in order to establish equilibrium is, therefore, about

$650,000.

6.

In my Confidential Despatch of the 13th. December I reported that I had increased the price of opium by El per tael and I stated that if the price were advanced in Hacao I would make a further advance here. The price in Kacas has been advanced by 50 cents a tael and I have therefore increased

the price here by the same amount and as the Macao price will shortly be increased to 11 per tael I propose to increase the

price here to 12 per tael on the 1st. of March. Hongkong opium

being of better quality is worth 1 per tael more than Macao

opium, with the price at $12 a tael in Hongkong the temptation

to smuggle to or from Macao and also to Canton is eliminated, and

apart from financial reasons the advance in price here is

necessitated by those considerations.

I should mention here that since the Govern-

-ment Monopoly was instituted 10 per centum to cover the loss in

discount has been added to the price of Prepared opium paid for

in subsidiary coin. Before the recent increase the price was

therefore l in notes and $12 in subsidiary coin.

The total revenue which is estimated during

1916 from opium, allowing for the additions in price indicated

above, is now estimated at $5,263,030 or 1,003,030 over the

estimate for the current year. From this 1,000,000 in round figures, must be deducted $200,000 for Military Contribution.

of the sum gb,253,030, 84,614,480 will be

collected in subsidiary coin while £1,350,000 represents similar

collections from other sources principally from the Railway, These figures give a total of £5,964,480 of subsidiary coin. The loss in discount (10%) and the cost of demonetising (10%) may be taken at 20% or 1,192,996. This is $442,896 more than the vote

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