*
9
UNCLASSIFIED
SAVING DESFATCH
HKK 18/11
From the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
To the Governor, HONG KONG
24 March, 1969
No. 122
I am sorry that you have had to remind us that we have not replied to your Saving Despatch no. 1323 of 9.10.68 about the Hong Kong (Non-Domiciled Parties) Divorce Rules.
2.
There has been delay because when the Law Officers first looked at your draft Rules they had to consider whether the Secretary of State had the necessary legal power to make the Rules. The Legal Advisers first view was given in a minute from which the paragraphs below have been extracted:
"The Hong Kong Divorce Jurisdiction Order in Council 1935 (made under section 2 of the Indian and Colonial Divorce Jurisdiction Act 1926) applied the provisions of section 1 of that Act to Hong Kong in like manner as those provisions applied to India, subject to certain modifications, one being that in the application to Hong Kong the reference in those provisions to the Secretary of State in Council of India section 1 (4) of the Act should be read as referring to the Secretary of State for the Colonies. So far as I can ascertain this provision is still in force without any amendment and no provision was made in either of the two Orders which I mention below for the transfer from the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the Secretary of State for Commonwealth Affairs of the power conferred upon the former by the 1935 Order in Council. The Orders I refer to here are:-
Bonew
3 NKK 18/24
The Transfer of Functions (Miscellaneous) Order 1967 (No. 1967/486); and
The Transfer of Functions (Secretary of State and Minister of Overseas Development) Order 1967 (No. 1967/973)
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