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THE RENTS ORDINANCE. AN AMENDING BILL TO CHECK **RECONSTRUCTION." "WASTEFUL USE OF COLONY'S BUILD

ING RESOURCES."

The Government Gazette contains the draft of a short Bill to further amend the Rents Ordinance 1929.

The Attorney-General explains in the Object and Reasons attached to the Bill that the object of the Bill is to pre- vent the reconstruction of houses which are in a substantially good condition The reconstruction of houses which are in a reasonably good condition," the Attorney-General says, is a wasteful

цас

RABLES.

THE HONGKONG DAILY PRESS, MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19TH, 1994.

FULL COURT JUDGMENT. CHARTER PARTY CASE APPEAL DISMISSED,

1.6.

Full:

THE SCUTTLING OF THE "MARY BORLOOK.": CAPTAIN JUSTIFIED: CREW COMMENDED:

COMPANY REPORTS.

ORIENTAL COTTON SPINNING AND

WEAVING Co, 1990

In the course of his address at the PRESIDENT TAFT TO BE RECOM-seventh annual meeting of the above

MENDED TO BOARD OF TRADE,

Compans, held at Shanghai on the "oth inst Mr. H. E. Arnhold said:-

SIR SKINNER TURNER DISAGREES.

At the Supreme Court on Saturday morning, judgment was delivered on an "appeal, which was heard before

Court in November last, the Court con-

The Court of Enquiry which met on

The Cotton situation out here has been sisting of the Chief Justice (Sir William Thursday last to enquire into the circum Rees-Davies). Sir Skinner, Turner of staners attending the abandoning and aggravated by the gread extent to which HB.M. Supreme Court, Shanghai, and scuttling of the British steamer, Mary the Puisne Judge (Mr. Justice Gompertz). Harlock, met on Saturday at noon at this local staples are being watered, which The sitting of the Full Court arose out Marine Magistracy, when the findings of occurs regularly whenever cotton ralizes of an appeal against the derision of the Court were announced by the Fres are high. The unfortunate state of affairs, the Chief Justice (Sir William Rees dent, Lieut-Com. Corway Hake, R.N.R. Davies) in 3 Charter Party agreement

The President said: We find that the both politically and with regard to the Trade action. In November ut 1018, it was British 8. Mary Harlock, official number cotten situation, still continues. of the building resources of the

agreed between the Cheong Yue Steam-131.818. of Harwick, registered tonnage languishes owing to the absence, ca Colony, even where the reconstruction ship Co., Ltd, of Hongkong, and a firm 3.2245, of whom the Master was Bob Central Government capable of exercising provides additional floor area; and in of Indian merchants, named Dharsi Malji Charles Hill, Extra Master 000,616, some cases the floor area is reduced. Such reconstruction necessarily involves and others, of Chitagong. India, that the Sunderland, sailed from Tacoma on the effective control over the Provinces.

With the price of cotton at a level would be chartered to 20th December, 1923, bound for Yokohama Singaporean temporary reduction in the domestic the merchants from April 1st, 1917, for with a full cargo, including deck cars, which brings the cost of the manufactur accommodation of the Colony, and it is

ten months at 825,000 per month. In of timber. The ship encountered pr against the spirit of the Rents Ordi-March, 1917, however, the ship was consistent gales, and rough seas, and ac 0.30d yarn to abour Tis. 20 per bale above mandeered by the Naval authorities at a.m. on the 20th January, during a markes price for the spun yarn, mills Reconstruction is dealt with at present Singapore and when the charterers learn strong gale, lurched heavily to Port. cannot take the risk of covering their in scation 4 (1) (1) of Ordinance No. 1 ed of that fact, they sent a telegram to causing the cargo on the after deck to

Many Chinese of 192 That paragraph provides that lessor can recover possession in order to the ship's owners saying they would re-shift, damaging the after bulwarks and requirements far ahead.

quire the vessel when she was released. giving the vessel a heavy list to Port. mills have already closed down, and it reconstruct upon giving three months That release did not come about until The ship began to make water in No. is probable that most mills will have to notice to the tenant, provided that the March 1913-two years later and the Hold, and continued in list to Port.

go on hali. time after the China New notice is accompanied by a certificate charterers then refused to take her, claim- Pumps were immediately started and "an

Year. from the Building Authority to the effecting that the charter party had expired. attempt was made to jettison the cargo, that the intended reconstruction will be The Cheong, Yee Steamship Co, however, when at 10 am, ship still making water The outlook cannot, therefore, „de con- auch as to make the building a new build-

maintained that the telegram was bind and the list increasing dangerously, the sidered encouraging, but Chim is ing within the meaning of Ordinance No. ing. At fr parte arbitration took place Master decided to abandon the ship. The country of surprises. The statistical post- 1 of up. The present bill proposes to as a result of which the

owners were United States 8.8. President Taft wastion is strong. And if the various politica! enact that the notice to quit shall not be awarded $164,910.87 as damages. In communicated with by wireles telegraphy parties can come together, with the result valid unless the rertificate of the Build-order to enforce that award, the case was and arrived at 3 p.m. Af inlets were that fighting does not reoccur, and that ing Authority which is served with it con, brought before the Chief Justice and his opened to the sen with a view to hasteu- real effort is made to suppress taios also a statement to the effect that decision was that the charterers had to ing the sinking of the ship. Ac 0.30 p.m. banditry, a revival of trade would set in the intended reconstruction is desirable. pay. There was an appeal against that on Clause 3 of the bill provides that the judgment, this being tried in November on January 26th the ss. Mary Herlock which would enable the mills to operate was abandoned in Int. 3009 N., Long, satisfactorily, provided they would be in certifiente is not to be given unless the last, as stated above.

133°46'E. The crew in the Mary Har- a position to obtain sufficient cotton. Building Authority is of opinion that the The appellants case was conducted by inc's boat were transferred to the 8.5 condit of the domestic quement in Mr. C. G Alabaster, K.C. (instructed by President Taft. The ss. Mary Harlock, question is such as to make the intended Messrs, Deacon, Haraton and Shenton), when last seen, had a list of 40° to Port reconstruction desirable,

An appeal is while Mr. Eldon Potter, KC., and Mr. and was down by the Stern. provided to the Governor-in-Council On F. "C. Jenkin (instructed by Messrs.. such appeal the Governor-in-Council willWilkinson and Grist) appeared for the have an unfettered discretion, and will not respondents. bo limited to the consideration of the eendition of the building. This is in under to meet such special cases as the erection of large modern building on the site of several amall and old houses, or the fresh development and laying-out

of an entire block.

Very lengthy written judgments were delivered and the following is a summary of the judgments by the three Judges

His Lordship the CHIEF JUSTICE, in the course of his judgment, said that the argument before the Court turned largely on the question of jurisdiction of the arbitrator and in this direction he entirely agreed with the judgment of his learned brother (Mr. Justice Gompertz).

dinner and still unexpired at its con was final unless it could he impugned on

the

At tho

notice that had it not been for the beavy Turning to the accounts, you will charge of interest, there would have been no loss on the year's working. the ship was well found, sufficiently macularly that the company was under That upon the evidence given we find last minual meeting, I emphasised parti ned and seaworthy at the time of her de expitalized, and I recommended an in- parture, that she was tot overloaded: her

crease of capital. Unfortunately, owing cargo was well and properly stowed.

.s. Mary Terlock was due to the shif

Wo find that the abandonment of the ing of her deck cargo, through stress of weather damaging the ship to such an extent to cause a leak and thereby a dangerously iccreasing list.

.

We consider that the Master was justified in. abandoning the s. Mary Horlack and souttling the regal, and we commend Captain Hill and his crew for their seamanship in launching the boat and transferring the crew without zocid ent, under auch difficult conditions.

not become available to the Company the difference of opinion amongst the shareholders, this increase of capital did until the second half of the year, and but for this, the amount shown for interest | would have been very much lower.

At the end of the year we held stocks of 2009 bales of yarn and 3.021 bales of cloth which we could have sold at the time at price which would have wiped out the loss, but in view of the position after China New Year, your General of trade and the higher prices anticipated Mangers decided to carry the goods into the old fear and wipe out the low.

WHEN LUNCHING AT A FRIEND'S

CLUB, HOW ONE COMPARES THIS-AND- THAT! THE SIEVICE, THE APPOINT-

MENTS, THE CATERING, BUT ABOTE

ALL, THE MEMBIES, AND TET THE

STANDING OF A CLUB MAY DE

KNOWN TRÖM THE HAT · BACK.

· COUNT THX LINCOLN DENNETTA!.

LANE, CRAWFORD'S

pregnyl GLEE TOSKA

SOLE AGENTS FOR

LINCOLN and BENNETTS

THIS STORE WILL BE CLOSED AT 1 O'CLOCK DURING RACE DAYS.

LAN, CRAWFORD, LTD.

that every notice to quit given before the the. face of the award. The approves the Board of Trade to the prompt arrival the new year rather than sell them into

M. Y. SAN & The Court desires to direct attention of

moncement of t

of the U.S... President Taft, and to the volunteer boat's crow who effected the final rescue which was made possible by the free use of oil.

Clauses and 3 of the bill standing alone, would apply only to notices to quit given after the youneneraent of the new Ordinace, but it is considered desirable

The respondents' vase was that the dis- that the restriction proposed in the bill pute between the parties was covered by should be applied also to notices to quit the arbitration clause and that the urbi giren before the countercement of the newtrator's decision, whether right or wrong.

mencement. Clause 4, therefore, provides

ground of fraud or error of law ou evancement of the Ordinance under said that the contract was gone section 4 (1) (5) of the principal Ord-March 1019 and that therefore there was nance which is still unexpired at the con submission in existence under the f the new Ordinance shall he charter party which had then run out, invalid unless a certificate that the in and they further said that the question of tended reconstruction desirable is obtain

whether the contract was or was not in ed from the Building Authority during the

existence at the time of the arbitration currency of the three months notice to proceedings was a matter for the Court quit. An appeal to the Governor-in ad not for the arbitrator to decide. Council is also provided in this case.

Numerous authorities had been cited in Owners of property who have already argument, and if he were to construe given notices to quit for the purpose of them correctly he would be clear as to reconstruction should abserve that their the conclusion at which he should arrive notices will be invalid unless they "enn

Ilis Lordship then proceeded to deal obtain the necessary certificate either with a number of similar cases in which from the Building Authority or from the his Lordship deemed it practicable to ect Governor-in-Council, before the three out some of the judgments in extenso, and arbitration clause existing; and (4) that. months expires. Accordingly, any owners he had only to any that they appeared the arbitrator had exceeded his jurisdic whose notices' will be on the point of ex-

to govern the case entirely. On their piring at the time when the Ordinance

authority he was of the opinion that the tin. The argumcet, turned largely on matters in dispute were within the furis jurisdiction. The appellants said they diction of the arbitrator, and for him were entitled to show that the contract alone to decide. For the Court to decide had gone before March, 1919, and the whether the contract was or was not in respondents urge that it was only open existence in 1910 was, to use Lord Justice to the appellants to challenge the find- Fry's language in the case of Hutchinsoning of the arbitrator on the issue of the P. Eaton, to beg the question."

will probably come fate, force if it is passed would he well advised to make application before-hand for the acessary certificate, so that the Building Authority Juny be in a position to issue the certi ficate in time. No doubt there are cases in which the Building Authority would be quite prepared to give the certificate.

Arfus.

THE MAGISTRAŬY. A WALKING ARSENAL Before Mr. J. B. Wood on Saturday 'a Chinese was charged by Inspector Me Walter with being in illegal powegian of The police officer stated that the Chinese wES brought into Mongkok Police Station on Thursday after some Ammunition had been found on him dur- ing u search in a sampan. It was also discovered that he had an automatic pistel concealed between his legs, la

rounds in his hat and another 12 rounds in his pockets.

Accused was remanded.

OLD SOLDIER'S' TALE.

A Chinese named Muk Chan-wing, who claimed to be an as-soldier recently dis banded at Kongmoon, was charged before Mr. G. N. Orme on Saturday with tres passing.

Dot-Inspector Appleton, prosecuting aid defendant was found wandering about the upper floors of the Central Police Station.

m.

NEW ENGINEERING AND SHIP. BUILDING WORKS LTD. The Court was composed of Lieut.-Com Hake, Harbour Master (President), Lieut. Com. R. W. F. Henderson, Super

Presiding the annual general meeting

at intendent of the Chart Depot, B.Vof this Company at Shanghai on the ach Dockyard; Capt. A. J. Hailey, Com- mander of the sa. Empress of Australia; Capt. G. Brors, Master of B... Chin Hua; and Capt. S. O. Mitford, Master of the 9. Su Sang..

existence of the contract in March, 1919, flis Lordship added that no attempt by showing that that issue did not come as made to set aside or remit the award the ground of irregularity, or any step taken to prevent its enforcement.

inst Mr. F. E. Arahold said:-

The amount standing to the credit of profit and loss account, including the amount carried forward from last year, amounts to Tis. 232,000.49, which you will be asked to approve of for appropriation as follows:--

Th

52,500.00

To pay a dividend of 5" per„

ent. on the Ordinary # shares

To pay the preference share

dividend of 8 per cent....120,000.00 To carry forward balance. 59,600-49

Total Tis. 222,000.48,

The above result, although showing substantial reductions as compared with the year 1900, is, in the opinion of your board, gratifying and encouraging. The great depression in the engineering and Shipbuilding trade, to which I referred when addressing you last year has not. only continued but become more pro- nouseed and has resulted, so far as our company is concerned, in a reduced amount of construction work and so far as this side of our business is concerned I am afraid I cannot forecast any hopes of material improvement until we It se a revival of trade in this part of the seemed to him that the long silence be- world. Notwithstanding this unfortunate tween the parties between October, 1918, loss of work, I am glad to lay before unreason you a balance sheet, showing sufficient and March, 1919, betakened able delay." He considered the abitra profit not only to pay our preference tion proceedings were a nullity and that dividend but also to pay a small dividend the judgment of the court below should of 5 per cent. on the ordinary share be roversed. In his opinion the appeal capital of the company. Every effort is affect economies in working should be allowed and judgment entered being made for the appellants with costs in the to meet the strong competition we now have to face. I am pleased to inform you appeal court and below.

that during the past pear very consider able reductions have been made in the heavy overhand charges which a large organization, such as ours, is compelled to carry.

within the clause at all and also that this had never been pleaded. That seemed to him the whole crux of the case. It Dealing with the question of frustra seemed to him that there was no argu- tion, his Lordship pointed out that he ment on the point of recission and also had said in the Court below that the long that the contract remained ouc for a period intervening before the release of ten months' charter to run from some the ship as shown by the hiatus in the uncertain date of delivery. He held that correspondence from October, 1927, to the appellants failed on this point. On March, 1919, was certainly an element of the question of frustration he said the difficulty to him in the consideration of argumect meant that the charterers were the case; viz: whether the delay for left for ever at the mercy of the owners which neither party was responsibin was and he could not believe that the parties "so great and so long as to make it intended this should be the result. unreasonable to require the contracting parties to yo on with an adventure that may entitle cither of them at least while the contract is executory to consider it at an end."

The question of frustration was de pendent on the circumstances of each

3BC

and in bis judgment below, he rightly or wrongly, drew a distinction between this case, where there had been an exercise of the option of extending the charter with the knowledge on the part of the charterers that the ship was under requisition to Government, and without any safeguards to ensure that the exer- cise of the option was conditional on za early delivery of the vessel, and the cases relied on where no such conditions existed.

Defendant stated that" whilst at Canton he heard an old military comrade was in the House of Detention at Hongkong. The question, he thought, was whether Muk Chan-wing accordingly came down in the light of the action of the charterers to zes him,'

His Worship, in ordering the man to be returned to Kongmoon, said it was not safe to assume that defendant went to the Police Station with any bad intention, BANK SHROFF'S ALLEGED •

MISTAKE.

PAYE OUT $2,700 TOO MUCH.

At the Magistracy this morning hearing

九

Mr. Justice GoXPERTZ in delivering his judgment dealing with the question of frustration quoted from Halsbury that Frustration of a contract depends on the express or implied terms of the pon tract itself." Such a question was there- fore within a clause which refers any dis- pute under the contract to arbitration.

Clearly if any such dispute had arisen, say in 1917, a proper tribunal was the

The corre arbitral one and to other.

to which he had referred the condition spondence immediately following on ro ordinarily implied in contract, that quisition was clearly refcrable to clause where a delay in carrying out a contract 36 of the charter party and nothing else, for which neither party was responsible so that this too was a dispute within the no long as to make it unreasonable to reference. All these matters then were require the partica to go on with the for the arbitrator to decide and for no adventure entitled either of the partics other tribunal. And it mattered not, sub- to consider it at an end-whether such &ject to exceptions to which he had already condition had application in the present referred and which had no place there, whether his decision was right or wrong on law or on facts. As was pointed out

ship, The

Sir.

DIVIDEND ANNOUNCEMENT.

Messrs. Benjamin and Potts are in receipt of advice from their Shanghai Office to the effect that The Shanghai Loan and Investment Co., Ltd, has declared a dividend of Th. 0.50 for Last year. The profit amounted to Tis. 185,009.

引

KOWLOON SEAMEN'S

12

INSTITUTE.

facts are, concluded his Lord

Last Friday evening the Kowloon Sea arrived at my conclusions with some limited jurisdiction cannot give itault ita Hongkong sister and beld the Art "I think singular, and although by Mr. Justice Coleridge, a court of men', Institute followed the example of will be regumed of the larceny case in doubt I am inclined after further recon- jurisdiction by a wrong decision collateral of a fortnightly series of Whist Drives. which a Chinese office boy employed by the sideration to adhere to them. In my to the merits of the case as to facts on In spite of the bad weather and other firm of Fung Tang & Co, is charged with opinion the appeal should be dismissed." stealing the sum of £2,700, the property or the Funyan, in his judgment, this case the decision was not on a point tory attendance, and a very happy time which its jurisdiction depended. But in social events there was quite a satisfac- of the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank.

According to the prosecution's outline said that the defences raised were (1) collateral to the merita-the finding was

wha spent by the competitors. In order. on the merits and on the very matters to give this new venture a good start, of the case a bank shroff handed the lad that the charter-party bad expired by #3,000 instead of $300 when a cheque for effluxion of time and with it the arbitra- as to which the partica had agreed that Mr. and Mrs. Sellwood undertook the the latter amount was tendered. De tion clause; (2) the objects of the charter the award should be final fendent donios recuroring more than $300. party had been frustrated and thus the Mr. M. K. Lo is prosecuting on behalf arbitration clause had gone, (3) the char- of the Bank, whilst Mr. F. O. Jenkin tor party of November, 1910, had been instructed by Mr. F. G. Vaux) appears rescinded and there was therefore no for defendant.

(Continued at foot of nezl œlumn.)

If he was right in his conclusion so to the jurisdiction it was unnecessary for him to go farther and consider the merits of the case. In his opinion the appeal should be dismissed with costs.

organisation, Mr. Bellwood also acting as M.C. The winners were:-Ladies: 1st, Mynco; 2nd, Mrs. Chatleding: Booby, Mrs. Turton. Men: 1st, Mr. Bedwood; 2nd, Mr. Hynes; 3rd, Mr. Woods; Booby,

Mr. Teala

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