112430-1927-Supplementary-Draft-Bills--Printers-and-Publishers-Magistrates-Amendment-Hong-Kong-Police-Reserve — Page 19

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2. Section 2 amends section 8 of the principal Ordi- nance by making the Deputy Harbour Master a marine magistrate. When that section was amended in 1926 the office had not been created.

3. The proviso to section 10 (2) of the principal Ordinance, 1890, provides that nothing therein con- tained, ie, presumably, nothing contained in section 10, shall oblige a magistrate to issue a summons in any case where the defendant appears voluntarily or upon his recognizance or is in the custody of the police or charged upon the charge sheet. There is no provision which expressly empowers the magistrate in such an event to proceed to hear and determine the case. Section 3 of this Ordinance remedies the omission.

4. Section 11 (1) of the principal Ordinance pro- vides that if a defendant does not appear in answer to a summons the magistrate may issue a warrant for his arrest (1) upon being satisfied by oath that the sum- mons was duly served, and (2) on oath being made before the magistrate substantiating the matter of the complaint or information. It has long been the prac- tice to issue this warrant upon sworn evidence of the service of the summons, without requiring the com- plaint to be substantiated by oath. The reason for this practice is probably to be found in the form of warrant which is given in the First Schedule and which is referred to in the margin of the section, i.e., Form No. 2. That form recites sworn evidence of the service of the summons but does not recite that the matter of the complaint was substantiated by oath. Section 4 of this Ordinance amends the section in question so as to make it agree with the practice. Section 6 of the principal Ordinance provides that "The forms in the First Schedule shall be deemed good, valid and sufficient in law." It is a curious thing that exactly the same discrepancy between the section and the form occurs in the case of section 2 of the Summary Juris- diction Act, 1848 and Form (B) in the Schedule to that Act. Section 13 of the Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1848, and section 14 of the Magistrates Ordinance, 1890, require only sworn evidence of the summons. Section 9 of the Indictable Offences Act, 1848, does not even require sworn evidence of the service of the summons, but Form (D) in the Schedule to that Act recites that service has been proved by oath.

5. Section 5 amends section 31 of the principal Ordinance so as to make it agree with and include the provisions of section 49 of that Ordinance. Section 49 being thus no longer necessary is therefore repealed by section 6 of this Ordinance.

6. Section 6 repeals section 49 of the principal Ordinance because, as explained in the preceding para- graph, its provisions are now included in section 31 of the principal Ordinance.

7. Section 7 repeals section 78 of the principal Ordinance and substitutes a new section which agrees better with section 11 of the Criminal Procedure Ordinance, 1899, Ordinance No. 9 of 1899.

8. Section 8 inserts in the principal Ordinance a new section 78A which deals with the procedure in the case of a charge against a corporation of an indictable offence. This section is based on certain portions of section 33 of the Criminal Justice Act, 1925, 15 and 16 Geo. V, c. 86. It may be convenient to point out here that service on a limited company registered under the Hong Kong Companies Ordinance is pro- vided for by section 117 of Ordinance No. 58 of 1911, and that service on companies incorporated outside the Colony which establish a place of business here is