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HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL.
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We welcome the initiation of a specially trained Gaol Hospital Staff; a measure which is aptly described by the Honourable Colonial Secretary as a "long delayed reform."
Whilst conceding that printing is a suitable occupation for certain classes of prisoners, we are opposed to the enlargement of the printing appliances in the present Gaol for the following rea-
sons:
The prison is overcrowded, and the proposal to erect a printing shop within the prison at a cost of $100,000 will make congestion even worse. On this ground alone the unofficial members are unanimously opposed to the printing scheme.
Moreover to sink at the present time $100,000 into a building that may before long be demolished with the removal of the Gaol to a larger and more suitable site is a waste of public money for the sanction of the expenditure of which the Unofficial members feel they are constrained to withhold their approval.
Another pressing need is an adequate water-supply.
It seems most regrettable that your Excellency is not even now able to lay before us definite waterworks extension proposals under the second section of the Shing Mun scheme, seeing that the full needs of Hong Kong Island are not (as we gather from Mr. Hender- son's Reports) met, under present arrangements, and even with the pipe-line across the Harbour and the building of the Aberdeen Reservoir, up to a later period than the year 1932.
Also it must be borne in mind that the construction of the big Shing Mun dam, which apparently is the corner-stone of the second section scheme, will take many years to complete even after the plans for it have been drawn up and decided on.
We consider it a matter for grave criticism that the Government in connexion with our water supply disregarded the unanimous advice of the Unofficial members, given in this Council on the 4th November 1926, urging the Government to bring the pipe-line across the Harbour.
On that occasion, I, speaking on behalf of all the Unofficial members of this Council, said as follows:-
"As reards the Water Supply, we notice that the Estimates for 1927 do not provide for the bringing of the water from the Shing Mun Valley across the Harbour as was originally intended; and we are disappointed to find that the Colonial Secretary's remarks, in introducing the Budget, contain no reference whatever to so important a matter as the securing of
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