Secretariat File No. 46/5061/47.
CONFIDENTIAL.
No.19
54377/48
Sir,
56
bund (5)
GOVERNMENT HOUSE,
HONG KONG.
30 January, 1948.
I have the honour to refer to paragraph 31 of my
(12) om 54126/6/47 confidential despatch No. 292 of the 12th December, 1947, in
on (that N(IA)
which I briefly touched on the position in regard to certain vessels allocated to this Colony for rehabilitation purposes.
2.
It was obvious that the port could not operate efficiently on the reoccupation of the Colony by the British Forces, unless a fleet of small craft was made available to replace the pre-war vessels which had either disappeared or had been rendered unserviceable during the Japanese occupation. For this reason suitable craft were earmarked from general war stocks for immediate despatch to the British Military Administration in Hong Kong though, as a result of a series of delays, a number of these vessels did not actually reach the Colony until after the Military Administration had handed over to the Civil Government. These small craft formed an essential cog in the machinery of the Military Administration as, without them, the latter could not have carried out the functions for which it was designed. Indeed, an adequate supply of this type of vessel was as important as first aid repairs to wharves which had been damaged by demolition charges for, if there had been a breakdown in either of these services, the occupying forces could not have been landed without extreme difficulty. As, therefore, these craft formed part of the equipment necessary for the success of a military operation, it was never anticipated that any claim in respect 2 of them would be presented to the Civil Government. It is
true that the latter has, since the termination of the Military Administration, been able to utilise them for its own purposes, but they are far from ideal for the duties on which they are engaged and, had this Government had any choice in the matter, they would, in many instances, have selected vessels of a different type. Moreover, if a Colony has been stripped of its harbour craft by an invading army and it has become necessary for the mother country to provide replacements for the purpose of re-occupation by its own forces and for the initial period of Military Administration, it did not seem an unreasonable supposition that the value of these craft on the date on which Civil Government was restored might be written off to general war expenditure.
3.
Some months ago the Director of Marine, as disposal agent for the Ministry of Transport in this Colony, received communications from the Ministry intimating that it was their desire to dispose of these vessels, and to wind up the disposal machinery in Hong Kong as soon as possible. It was noted with some dismay that the Ministry regarded these craft as being on loan to the Hong Kong Government for rehabilitation purposes, and that they proposed that the latter should purchase such vessels as they might still require for service here.
A copy of two of these letters is enclosed, together with a compre- hensive list of the vessels in question, showing their origin
THE RIGHT HONOURABLE
RECEIVED 6 FEB 1948
ARTHUR CREECH JONES, M.P.
C. Ó. RECY
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