CO129-498-2 Canton boycott- opening of negotiations with the Canton Government 2-11-1925 - 23-12-1925 — Page 12

Enclosure 1.7

Cheloenae

No.8

Enclosure

λo.q.

Therefore, on December 15th, I wrote him a letter of which I attach a copy, and sent it to Canton by the hand of Dr To Ying-kwan who is a personal friend of Mr. Wong Tsing-wai. Dr. To Ying-kwan was trained in Western medicine at Edinburgh, and has for a long time past been practising his profession in Hongkong. He is an avowed member of the Chinese Nationalist Party, and knows personally all the members of the present Canton Soviet. He agreed to support my letter with his own arguments, and to bring me back an answer from Mr. Wong Tsing-wai. Dr To's mission proved entirely successful, for on December 18th Mr. Wong Tsing-wai wrote me a letter, of which I enclose a copy, and which was handed to me on December 19th by Mr. Sung Tsz-man the Head of the Canton Treasury. Mr. Sung Tsz-man spent the night of the 19th December with me at Government House and returned to Canton on the 20th December accompanied by Mr. A.G.M.Fletcher.

I had a very full discussion on theipresent situation with him at Government House on the afternoon of the 19th December, when there were also present: Messrs. A.G.M.Fletcher, J.H.Kemp, E.R.Hallifax, and D.W.Tratman. I attach a note prepared by Mr. Tratman of the conversation which then took place, from which you will see that the two points emphasized by Mr. Sung Tsz-man as necessary for a settlement of the strike were: (a) compensation of the strikers for the period during which they had been out of work, and (b) re-instatement of strikers in their original jobs. As regards re-instatement, this is of course impossible in those cases where jobs in which strikers were

previously employed have since been filled by

1

otherm man