Sessional_Paper_1905 — Page 662

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A.

Sir KENELM E. DIGBY, K.C.B.,

Permanent Under Secretary of State,

HONGKONG, September 5th, 1903.

Whitehall.

SIR, We have the honor to acknowledge receipt of your letter dated 17th July, 1903, addressed to Messrs. Trass and Taylor, the London Agents of Mr. Stephens informing them that His Majesty the King had not been pleased to give any commands regarding the petition presented to His Majesty by Messrs. Steph- ens and Howard in the matter of the Award of the Acting Governor of Hongkong for damages to our Hongkong Marine Lot No. 184 by the Praya Reclamation Works.

In view of a previous letter from the Home Secretary's Office, B.37068/6, under date 14th April, 1903, written by direction of the Secretary of State, we do not understand why His Majesty has not been pleased to give any commands regarding our Petition, inasmuch as that letter informed us that the Secretary of State had been in correspondence with the Colonial Department on the subject and that the case did not appear to be one for a "Petition of Right" as there was no matter for litigation between the Petitioners and the Crown, and the letter con- cluded as follows:-"It is, however, open to Messrs. Stephens and Howard to present a Petition to His Majesty asking for relief in the circumstances in which they are placed."

Those circumstances are that our Marine Lot held under Crown Lease was destroyed as a Marine Lot by the Praya Reclamation made in front of it for a public purpose, and the amount awarded by the Acting Governor of Hongkong was evidently by some mistake or accident (we were not heard in the matter) a totally inadequate award, but against which we had no legal remedy, as we learned after litigation extending over several years that His Majesty's Courts had no jurisdiction over an Executive Officer of the Government, and our remedy, as we understood from your Office letter of the 14th April last, was that of presenting a petition to His Majesty, which we did, praying for relief under the circumstances of our case set out in the Petition.

We naturally considered that the result of the correspondence between the Secretary of State and the Colonial Department was that the relief sought by our Petition would be granted as a matter of right and justice to us when asked for in the manner indicated.

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The relief has not, however, yet been granted and no reason given for with- holding it, nor any information given to us whether the Award was arrived at after examination of the facts or not, and we can only come to the conclusion that further information has been requested from the Colonial Government to enable His Majesty's Ministers to decide what the measure of the relief shall be.

In that belief, and as the matter is of great importance, we desire to bring to your notice the salient points of this case so far as they affect us as His Majesty's Crown Lessees.

The case was decided against us on a point of law, and the facts have not been heard by the Courts.

1. The Governor, Sir William Des Voeux, who passed the Reclamation Ordinance, wrote to the Honourable C. P. Chater, in the Colonial Secretary's letter of 23rd June, 1888, as follows:-

"The Foreshore belongs to the Crown and to the Crown alone belongs the right of reclaination and of ownership in the land reclaimed, the only obligation attaching to the latter being that of com pensating the frontage owner for the difference, if any, between the value of his Marine Lot and the value of the same land con- verted into an Inland Lot by the Reclamation in front of it.” See Letter in Petition, Appendix 2.