CO129-511-6 Salaries and conditions of service of government staff 27-4-1928 - 2-11-1928 — Page 28

28

Sir C. Clementi has returned from Hong Kong

full of optimism for the immediate future of the

Colony. When he left trade had more or less returned

to normal and there was every indication that the Chinese in Kwangtung were heartily sick of wars, strikes, and boycotts, and welcomed the prospect of a period of peace. The Cantonese appeared to like

Li Chai-sum who was out to maintain law and order

and to suppress Communist agitation; moreover he had refrained from squeezing them like his predecessors and had even made some efforts to return to the merchants a proportion of the funds seized from them during his absence at Shanghai. For these reasons he anticipated that the present Canton Govt. would be able to maintain itself without serious difficulty during the next two years or so and that in the meantime the full prosperity of the Colony would be restored. Although, therefore, after allowance has been made for the aerodrome, the Shing Mun Scheme, and the Aberdeen Water Scheme. the surplus balances of the Colony shrink on paper to very small dimensions, Sir C. Clementi anticipates a large increase in revenue and considers that we shall have no difficulty about the finance for some time to

come.

The moment, therefore, is not inopportune for tackling Hong Kong salaries which are admittedly in sore need of revision. We have felt for same years that the salaries allotted to officers recruited from England were unjustifiably low and we were on the point of making proposals for their review when the Canton boycott supervened in 1925.

We may,

therefore.