Sir,
Enclosure No. 1.
Chief Justice's Chambers,
Courts of Justice,
Hong Kong.
20th May, 1931.
41
in form 2 in
Schedule
I have recently noticed the Deportation
Amendment Ordinance, 1931, which became law on the 2nd
April, 1931, and I have the honour to ask that I may be
allowed to address Your Excellency on the subject. So
far as I can ascertain, the bill was never referred to
the Judges.
2.
The ordinance, I venture to submit, places
on the Judges duties of a kind not usually imposed on
a High Court or Supreme Court judge, or indeed on any
regular judicial officer. The duties are ministerial
except of course the important judicial duty of finding
whether the allegations in the fourth question are well
founded in fact, and up to that point the judge seems to
be given no real control over the proceedings, such as
he would have in an ordinary case before him. For
example, it is not clear that he would have any power
to call before him any person who had made a statement
in the case adverse to the accused, however desirable
it might seem to be that that statement should be tested
by further examination. Again, the scheme of a
judicial decision to be based on "evidence" given in
the absence of the accused, possibly by persons whose identity is concealed, and given without any opportunity
of cross-examination by the accused or examination by
the judge, is widely at variance from the ordinary
course of judicial procedure. Further, the judge is
deprived
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