CO129-543-13 Proposed amendments to Deportation ordinance 22-3-1933 - 11-1-1934 — Page 27

3.

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to which British Law has traditionally afforded asylum.

"Red Communism" has become a matter of international concern,

adding quite a new meaning to the word "political" if the

word can be applied at all.

5. This Colony, adjoining China, the best possible

hunting ground for "red" agitators, has to tread with

especial care in this connection. Revolutionary work

carried on in the Colony can be dealt with under our law, though it demands extreme watchfulness and care on the part

of the Police; but the use of the Colony as a safe base for

secret intrigue abroad may lead us into international

difficulties, especially with China. Action in such cases

must depend principally on written "evidence" from elsewhere,

a course beset by many obvious difficulties; and if it is

-

if a determined

taken in the form of banishment may well end watch on the suspected person's movements is kept, as it well

may be in spite of all precautions in making the Banishment

Warrant a Death Warrant as soon as the frontiers of the

Colony are crossed.

6. The Colony's difficulties may therefore be stated

thus : A banishment warrant contemplates no more than compulsory absence from the Colony under penalty for return; new conditions have created a position where compulsory ejection may mean much more and becomes very difficult, and between the necessity for curbing a suspect's activities here and for observing the spirit of the laws in the interests of the suspect, we are driven to the rather ridiculous

position that simple detention in the Hong Kong Gaol period almost at the option of the suspect becomes a very desirable solution for him of his difficulties.

7.

for a

Setting aside the possibilities of making red communistic activity an extraditable offence, I can only