600253-1939-Supplementary-Bills-read-a-first-time--Promissory-Oaths-Amendment-Interpretation-Amendment — Page 3

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9. All these officers are ex officio members of the Execu- tive Council, which however now also includes as ex officio official members the Senior Military Officer for the time being in command of His Majesty's regular troops within the Colony, and the Secretary for Chinese Affairs, and generally one or two other appointed official members.

10. In England under the Promissory Oaths Act, 1868, (31 and 32 Vict. c. 72) the First Part of the Schedule comprises the First Lord of the Treasury, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, the Lord Chancellor, the President of the Council, the Lord Privy Seal, the Secretaries of State, the First Lord of the Admiralty, the Chief Commissioner of Works and Public Buildings, the President of the Board of Trade, the President of the Poor Law Board, the Lord Steward, the Lord Chamberlain, the Earl Marshal, the Com- mander in Chief, the Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, the Paymaster General, the Postmaster General, the Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries, the President of the Board of Education, the Minister of Labour, the Minister of Health, the Minister of Pensions and the Minister of Transport.

11. While Part I in the proposed new Schedule does not seek to find local equivalents of that formidable list it is considered desirable that it should include all official members of the Executive Council.

12. Part II of the Schedule to the principal Ordinance deals with the persons required to take the oath of allegiance and the judicial oath. The new Part II differs from the old Part II only in the omission from the second paragraph of certain officials, all of whom are official justices of the peace and, therefore, included in the third paragraph, and of the provision that they had to take their oaths in the presence of the Governor. This is considered unnecessary especially as no corresponding official is included in the second Part of the Promissory Oaths Act, 1868. The new second paragraph of Part II provides for magistrates' oaths, being tendered by a judge.

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13. As all members of the Executive Council are required under section 7 of the principal Ordinance to take the oath of allegiance and as all the officers included in Part I of the Schedule will be members of that Council the words oath of allegiance and the" are not necessary in the first line of section 5 of the principal Ordinance. They are therefore repealed by clause 2 (a) of the Bill.

14. Sections 5 and 6 of the principal Ordinance require each of the officers named in Parts I and II of the Schedule

thereto to take their oaths as soon as may be after his acceptance of office". As this might imply that acting officers should take the oaths as often as they are appointed to act in any office, clauses 2 (b) and 3 of the Bill provide for the insertion of the word first between the words

* K

'his" and

acceptance".

1)

C. G. ALABASTER,

Attorney General.

September, 1939.