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54126/6/49
Treasury Reference
IF 4/09B
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19 21
TREASURY CHAMBERS,
GREAT GEORGE STREET,
LONDON, S.W.1.
7th December, 1949
Dear Palmer,
I am sorry to have caused a further delay in dealing with the long outstanding question of denials damage in
(6) Hong Kong which is the subject of your letter of 22nd September
1949.
I am not yet able to give a full answer to your letter as I have not yet seen any comments by the Service Departments, who are of course more intimately concerned with this despatch than with the despatch to Malaya since the complicated question of the destruction of property requisitioned by or on behalf of Service Departments is more to the forefront. So far as Malaya is concerned, a decision was reached at the meeting held at the Treasury on 23rd May 1949. So far as Hong Kong is concerned, the question was the subject of Interdepartmental correspondence last year. I think it is correct to say that on that occasion the three Service Departments agreed that no liability should be accepted for any property requisitioned for denial. But there was a difference of opinion about liability for property requisitioned for use and subsequently destroyed to deny it to the enemy. The War Office and the Air Ministry took the view that there was no liability. The Admiralty on the other hand thought that it would depend on the terms of requisition and that the Ministry of Transport would have to determine whether there is any naval liability under the Charter Party terms deemed to apply.
The Ministry of Transport said that they had settled many claims in respect af vessels scuttled whilst in service under
H. Palmer, Esq.,
Colonial Office
/requisition
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