CO129-549-14 Commission of Enquiry into trade of Colony 17-7-1934 - 18-1-1935 — Page 34

CONFIDENTIAL

DIEU

--

ET MON

DROIT

Government House, 3 ong hang.

3rd October, 1934.

45

quite reached bottom. It is in fact mainly due to a

careful policy during the past two or three years that

we have sufficient surplus balances to carry on for a

time and our revenue has dwindled very seriously.

With a heavy loss in transit trade there has been an

attempt to develop local industries and I do hope that

these will be sympathetically treated and that we shall

not have adverse tariffs put on them. In fact I do

sincerely hope that we may get some reasonable Empire

preference thereon.

I think that there is a good deal in what Pelham

says as to the undesirability of allowing Hong Kong's

commercial importance to decline for I feel that, more

especially perhaps as a financing centre, it is very desirable

that it should maintain a sound position in the Far East.

It is possible that the industrial development which we

see today may not grow and in any event with stabilization

and consequent industrial development in China the position

of local industries here would be far from strong as we

should always have to face high tariffs in China to protect