5
Mir. Emanuel and I attended a meeting at the Treasury yesterday afternoon which was held in accordance with the suggestion in my letter to Mr. James at No.5. There were present at the meeting, in addition to the Treasury representative Messrs. Goldberg and Haxwell Hicks of the Crown Agents and a representative of the Bank of England.
The Bank of England representative
expressed the view that there was at present no definite prospect of Hong Kong raising a loan on terms as favourable as any other Colony, in view of the political uncertainties and its financial position. The Crown Agents indicated that in these circumstances they would require an assurance that funds would be forthcoming to retire any advances they made from the Joint Colonial Fund zor Hong Kong special expenditure if, when the money was required it was still inadvisable, for any reason, to raise a loan. The Treasury then took the line that before agreeing to any assurance, they would require to be satisfied that the Colony was making every effort: to raise additional revenue, and that the principle of raising as much as possible locally was accepted. There followed some discussion on the latter point. Mr. Emanuel and I took the line that the Colony should not be required to raise money locally if it was going to cost them much more than if the money were raised in London, and Mr. Emanuel put forward the suggestion for a short term local loan. The Treasury representatives, however, were not in favour of this suggestion.
It was also mentioned in the course of the discussion that the Treasury representative at Chungking would shortly be visiting Hong Kong and that he would probably wish to discuss the possibilit, of a local loan to be subscribed by Chinese with holdings of Hong long dollars. The Treasury would like us to send a telegram to the Governor in this connection and I promised to do so after I had seen the telegram which the Treasury proposed to send to their representative.
I have distributed to those who were
present at the meeting the draft of a telegram to the Governor, on the lines which were agreed. I showed this draft to Mr. Emanuel before it went on and I incorporated an addition which he made on the second page.
lir. J.B. Williams and Mr. Caine might like to see the above minute and the draft telegram whilst I am waiting for comments.
7.082
28.8
5 To. R.L.M. James (Treas)
9. From. R.L.M. Janes (Jreas)
10.
"
R. L.M. Tamers (Treas)
27.8.46.
Cons
27/8/4/6
29/8/46
3078/46
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