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2. The Sanitary Board composed of four official and six unofficial members has power to make by-laws under the Public Health and Buildings Ordinance in matters appertaining to public health, subject to an overriding power in the Legislative Council.
3. There is a number of advisory boards and committees, such as the Board of Education, Harbour Advisory Committee, Labour Advisory Board, etc., composed of both official and unofficial members. They are frequently consulted and are of much assistance to the Government.
4. The English Common Law forms the basis of the legal system, modified by Hong Kong Ordinances of which an edition revised to 1923 has been published. The law as to civil procedure was codified by Ordinance No. 3 of 1901. The Colonial Courts of Admiralty Act 1890 regulates the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court in Admiralty cases.
5. The daily administration is carried out by the twenty- eight Government departments, which are officered exclusively by members of the Civil Service. The most important of the purely administrative departinents are the Secretariat, Treasury, Secretariat for Chinese Affairs, Harbour, Post Office, Imports and Exports Office, Police and Prisons departments. There are seven legal departments, amongst these being the Supreme Court and the Magistracies. Two departments, the Medical and Sanitary, deal with public health; one, the Education, with education; and one, the largest of all the Government depart- ments, the Public Works, is concerned with roads, buildings, waterworks, piers and analogous matters.
6. There have been no changes in the system of Govern- ment in the year under review.
Chapter III.
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2. The following table shows the estimated population for
the Colony for the middle of 1933.
Non-Chinese (mostly resident in Victoria and
Kowloon)
20,446
Chinese in Victoria
368,739
Chinese in Hong Kong Villages
45,286
Chinese in Kowloon and New Kowloon
286,896
Chinese in junks and sampans Chinese in New Territories
100,000
101,276
922,643
Total
3. During the year 2,787,436 persons entered and 2,712,389 persons left the Colony, making a daily average of 7,637 arrivals and 7,431 departures. The daily average for 1932 was 8,129 arrivals and 7,728 departures.
4. Registration of Births and Deaths is the rule in the urban districts but in the New Territories generally registration has not yet been fully enforced; therefore, in computing birth rates and death rates the population of the New Territories should not be taken into account.
5. The number of births registered was:
Chinese
Non-Chinese
14,909
453
6. The deaths registered among the civil population number 18,161 giving a crude death rate of 22.11 per mille as compared with 24.74 for the previous year.
Non-Chinese
Chinese
Deaths.
233
17,928
Estimated Death rate per Population. mille population.
20,446
800,921
11.39
22.38
POPULATION AND BIRTHS AND DEATHS.
Variation in population in Hong Kong is more dependent on immigration and emigration than on births and deaths. Movements to and from the Colony are influenced by events in China and owing to the large numbers who come and go daily it is impossible to give more than a very rough estimate of the actual population.
7. The number of deaths of infants under one year was Chinese 6,782, non-Chinese 40. If the figures for Chinese births represented the total births, which they do not, the infantile mortality figure for the Chinese would be 454.89 as compared with 525.28 in the previous year. The infantile mortality figure among non-Chinese was 88.30 as compared with 97.93 in 1932.
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