Sessional_Paper_1891 — Page 127

123

No.

91.

HONGKONG.

PETITION AGAINST THE NEW GAMBLING ORDINANCE.

Presented to the Legislative Council, by Command of His Excellency the Governor, on the

25th February, 1891.

To His Excellency Sir GEORGE WILLIAM DES Vœux, K.C.M.G., Governor and Commander-in-Chief of the Colony of Hongkong and its Dependencies, and Vice-Admiral of the same.

The petition of the undersigned Chinese Justices of the Peace, merchants and residents of Hongkong

RESPECTFULLY SHOWETH.

1.-That quite recently a Bill entitled The Gambling Ordinance, 1890, has been introduced and read a second time in the Legislative Council of this Colony.

2.-That your petitioners fully sympathise with and strongly support the Government in their endeavour to suppress public gambling and the numerous illicit gambling houses that unfortunately do exist in the Colony.

3.-Your petitioners have met together and gone very carefully through the new Ordinance. It was explained to them clause by clause by their representative in Council, and after mature deliberation, they are humbly of opinion that the proposed new law, though containing many drastic and stringent provisions, fails in dealing with the evil in an effective way, but on the other hand it may be so carried out as to affect seriously the many residents who are not gamblers but who occasionally may indulge in a social game for amusement in their own houses or properly constituted clubs.

4. Some time ago some of your petioners had the honour of conferring with the Registrar General on the very subject in question, and they then after much consideration recommended, as they do now, that a certain system of registration of Chinese clubs should be enforced and that the Registrar General and a certain number of the Chinese Justices of the Peace should be constituted into a Board of Enquiry and Registration. The object of this is not, as has been stated in some quarters, to license gambling to any extent within the walls of the registered clubs, but to distinguish the good from the evil and the legitimate from the illicit. Your Excellency will have no difficulty in seeing the difference between the playing of a game of chance and skill within the precincts of a respectable Chinese club for a low stake or for a nominal wager, more for amusement than otherwise, and the reckless gambling for gain in a gambling house. However, Section 4 of the new Ordinance clearly makes no distinction.

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5.-It has been stated by a high official of your Excellency's Government to the effect that a law providing for the registration of respectable Chinese clubs would savour much of a class legislation and that it is to be avoided. But your petitioners humbly submit that such a law is scarcely of the nature of a class legislation, since any club, whether it be the club of the rich or of the poor, can be registered if the Board of Enquiry and Registration is satisfied that it is not a club for gambling and is properly constituted and managed. Your petitioners further submit that it is but just and fair that the law-abiding and respectable Chinese