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HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
The demand for social betterment and social security, and the reliance upon taxation based on capacity to pay, represent a process which, clearly observable for years before the war, has received a tremendously added emphasis from the common effort, common toil and common suffering of the war years. If I may, with profound respect and humility, borrow and-to the extent of substituting "We" for "I"-paraphrase one of the numerous impressive and incomparable utterances of that great war leader the Rt. Hon. Mr. Winston Churchill, in the concluding part of his speech delivered to the House of Commons on the 20th August, 1940, I would say this:--
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For my own part, looking out upon the future, I do not view the process with any misgivings. We could not stop it if we wished; no one can stop it. Like the Mississippi, it just keeps rolling along. Let it roll. Let it roll on full flood, inexorable, irresistible, benignant, to broader lands and better days."
HON. MR. LEO D'ALMADA E CASTRO.—I shall vote against this Bill and my reasons for doing so are these:-That whereas I approve of direct taxation in principle, I feel, as I felt at the private. meeting of Unofficial Members of this Council some time ago, that this is not the proper time for its introduction. My reasons for feeling that, Sir, then as now, are two: first, because due allowance should be made for citizens and firms in Hong Kong to rehabilitate themselves after a period of four years during which nothing was earned and inroads made in many cases into capital saved-leeway, Sir, which in very many cases cannot have been made up in the short period since the liberation of this Colony. That view is not mine alone; it is shared by many, as reference to correspondence and articles in the local press in the last few weeks will have shown; and it is shared also by at least one responsible body in Hong Kong-the Committee of the Kowloon Residents' Association, which debated this Bill and which has expressed its views to Government by way of a letter addressed to Your Excellency.
My second reason for voting against this Bill, on the ground that this is not an opportune time for its introduction, is this; that, as we are on the threshold of a new form of Government in Hong Kong, rushing this Bill through now seems to me to savour very much of forestalling any opposition which may develop from the new Govern- ment of Hong Kong-if I may conveniently term it such-when that Government comes into office. On that point I beg to differ from certain remarks, if I have understood correctly, made by the last Honourable Member who spoke. He suggested that, whether or not we do get constitutional reform and a new kind of Government in Hong Kong, nevertheless the work of this present Legislative Council should go on. I agree with him in so far as if it be work necessary for running the Colony at the moment, if it be work which it is im- perative that this Council should do and cannot be put off, well and good, by all means let us do it; but to pass a measure such as this now, I can only liken to the present Labour Government in office in
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