CO129-572-8 Leave and passage regulations 4-2-1938 - 30-12-1938 — Page 2

CID. L.P.

Finance.

you

104

se rates

4.2.38

Submits certain questions for a suling

of exchange

2

The question at issue is whether officers

recruited locally who joined the Hong Kong Service

before the 31st December, 1902, are entitled to

=

payment of their pensions at the privileged rate of

exchange of $1 3/8 if they live outside Hong Kong.

This privilege no longer affects officers of the

grades normally recruited in this country since they

are all paid sterling salaries, and there is no

question of disturbing the established rates of

retired officers of these grades who have been in

receipt of dollar salaries and are entitled to

pension on the basis of the privileged rates.

It appears that the officers concerned

[now obsolete] claim these privileged rates by virtue of the General

Orders quoted in paragraph 2 of the despatch, which

state that officers not on sterling salaries draw

pensions in England and apparently elsewnere outsiue

Hong Kong)

(a) at the rate of $1

the 1st July, 1897,

3/8 if appointed before

(b) at the rate of $1 3/- if appointed before

the 31st December, 1902.

These General Orders lapsed at the time of

the 192% revision, and were replaced by General Order

154.

Officers now draw pension at the current rate

of exchange (at the moment about $1

=

1/2).

The question of whether the previous General

Orders can be taken as creating inalienable rights is

not one on which I feel competent to give an opinion,

but the Governor is advised that the officers

concerned nave no right to payment at the privileged

rates of exchange.

There is no question of the fixed

rates