CO129-558-3 Levy on Salaries- petition from Chinese Civil Servants 3-1-1936 - 19-12-1936 — Page 8

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(1) To begin with we must assume I think that X in the

If instead of telegram means what it says.

"240 per annum" the Governor had meant" an amount

obtained by converting £240 into dollars at X

shillings to the dollar" he would have said so

specifying X.

(2) I don't see anything to quarrel with over

the Governor's proposals for making allowance

cost of for the "lag in the rise of the local

living". But as the arrangements he proposes

are necessarily arbitrary I would make their actual imposition subject to review at the

appropriate stages in the light of circumstances

at the time.

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(3) But the main feature of these proposals is that

they provide for two distinct scales of levy -

one for dollar paid officers, and another for

Entiraly sterling-paid officers. This is no a distinc-

tion between the lower-paid and the higher-paid

staff, because, although the dollar-paid officers

are for the most part subordinate Chinese, many

of them on salaries of less than 1000 dollars

a year, they include some officers who

7,500 dollars (Chinese Medical Officers); and

although the sterling paid officers are for the

most part senior Europeans, they include some

officers who are on comparatively low rates of pay e.g. Nursing Sisters (£200- -£250) Prison Warders (£190-£330) Nor is it a distinction

between European and non-European,

can reach

since some

Europeans