242
LI
4
HIS EXCELLENCY-That is hardly a matter of finance.
Hon. Mr. SHEWAN-Sir, I am finished. We laugh at the Circumlocution Office and "how not to do it," and we say that Dickens ex- aggerated, but here is something quite worthy of that picture, and shows that the race of Tite Barnacles is not yet extinct. I also con- gratulate the Colonial Treasurer on the full and clear statement and explanations he has given of the items of revenue and expenditure; but I am sorry to see my old friends miscellaneous receipts and miscellaneous services still bulk too largely therein. Miscellaneous receipts. for instance, is composed almost wholly of two amounts-$120,000, profit from subsidiary coin- age, and $52,200, from conservancy contract; and here I would enquire why there was no profit from subsidiary coin the first half of this year, and more especially why the Government allow this profitable business to be spoiled and inter- fered with by the wretched Chinese coins that are flooding this place. Turning to the esti- mates themselves, the first thing that strikes one is that there is not much margin between revenue $7,195,000, and expenditure of $7,170,000, and if the Opium Farm, which is put down there for $2,200,000, or land sales, which figure for $500,000, should fail us, we shall be in Queer Street. Land sales, however, will probably do all that is expected, for the Colony is prosperous, the population is increasing, and land will pro- bably continue in good demand; but you must remember that in these land sales you are living on your capital, they are not revenue, and 75 years' leases will not improve that demand. It is the old official story. In 75 years we shall all be dead and gone, and after us-the Deluge. But you must consider that in a few years these leases will have run off considerably, and capitalists who are looking for land for their enterprise, or Chinese and others who want to buy property for their families, will look very askance at property which has only a life of perhaps 50 or 60 years left. It is true that there is some condition as to option of renewal for another 75 years, but the terms have to be re-arranged, and who is going to fix the new price or premium and the new Crown rent, etc.. etc.? It is altogether too vague and indefinite for business men--they can do better elsewhere- and the consequence will be that Government land on such terms will grow more and more out of favour. Talking of land reminds me I have seen Hongkong in its darkest days. when houses were to be had for the asking. and with no rent but payment of taxes. but I never thought that I should see it reduced to scraping the hillside for revenue, or the Government doing the very thing that it has often fined and imprisoned old women for doing. The great Colbert took credit for
■ notable saving for his master Louis the Fourteenth by substituting imitation lace for real lace on his officers' uniforms, and this cheese- paring spirit of income seems to have descended upon our present Prime Minister. For the last few weeks the Colony has been singing in chorus the old song Woodman, spare that Tree," to the Colonial Secretary; but in spite of what Shakespeare says about the man that is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, he has turned a deaf ear or hummed a song in reply that sounded very like "the Budget is coming, hurrah, hurrah!” Well, it has come now, and we find that the country is to be saved by the magnificent sum of $30,000, and I am not sure that even that is net. If you must get revenue from your trees why not plant rubber trees? They grow very well on this island, and the Colonial Secretary can enjoy himself tapping or milking them for revenue without des- troying and devastating the landscape. If the beauty of our hills, of which we have long been proud since we planted them, is to be sacrificed to the exigencies of finance, the next thing I suppose we shall see will be that the Public Gardens have been turned into market gardens, and Othello's occupation being gone, the head of the Botanical Department will find useful em- ployment in hawking vegetables round the town. Nearly half a million dollars spent upon the Sanitary Department must give us pause and make the ordinary man wonder if we get our money's worth, and if it is worth all that expenditure. It does seem a subject of reflec. tion that, in spite of our expenditure and precautions and our boasted Western medical
44
THE HONGKONG WEEKLY PRESS AND
science, the plague should run its course here, just exactly as it does neither sooner nor later in Canton, where nothing is done to contend with it. am glad to see so much put down for expen- diture on public works, but I hope Mr. Jones will not at the end of the year tell us, as some of his predecessors have done, that they never expected to spend all that money or do all that work, for they never had the men, etc., etc. If he feels that way he should speak out now, or for ever hold his peace. When are the promised experiments in wood paving and other mate- rials for road making to be commenced? When is he going to remove the Clock Tower which obstructs Queen's Road, and, I hope, cast it into the sea? Will he now push on vigorously with the Law Courts and the Post Office? gard to the former I still think that it should have been designed by local architects, who are now putting up buildings worthy of any Euro. pean city, even Birmingham. There is an old Scottish saying which Sir Walter Scott was very fond of repeating, that we should keep our ain fishguts leamaws for our ain seamaws. It is not a sentiment that I am over much in love with, but it is the doctrine
"1
In re.
more
mere
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[October 3, 1904
splendid chance of laying deep their plans for the future. We want over there main roads, 125ft., not 50ft. wide, with broad boulevards and arenues with, I was going to say, rows of fine shade-giving trees down them. But the thought of so much firewood running to waste would be too harrowing to the feelings of the Colonial Secretary and his friend the. Woodcutter when they took their walks abroad over there. Don't tell me that it can't be done, we are tired of
hearing of that word “can't ́ ; if you won't do it then give us good reasons; if it is want of money that prevents you doing these things How properly. then let us have a Loan. humiliating, how mortifying it was for me to be told the other day by a German friend who had recently been to Tsingtau, that there was not a road in Hongkong that could compare with those they have in Tsingtau. Think of it, gentlemen. Hongkong, the fifth port in the world. I do beseech the Government to look ahead, for there will be tramways and railways some day in Kowloon, and we should not always work till the last minute and leave then do it in the scrimpiest and cheapest I Before I sit down manner possible.
one mun
The COLONIAL SECRETARY-Sir, The re- marks of the hon. member have certainly furnished two surprises which I myself never expected to experience in this Council Cham- ber.
One is that actual praise should have been meted out to subordinate officials in Hong. kong, which I thought was a thing that never could happen here, and the other is that a gentle. man. sir, an Englishman, a member of this Council, a man who holds a considerable posi- tion in this Colony, should stand up and in the presence of two of our Chinese subjects
(Hon Mr. SHEWAN: Fellow subjects)- and of the Press, who will duly report his remarks, employ terms regarding a former representative of His Majesty the King in this Colony which I should have thought any man would have been ashamed to utter. Now, sir, there are-
that Mr. Chamberlain preaches. A little prac-must make one honourable exception to my There is tice is worth a deal of precept, and Hongkong charge of lack of imagination.
have may work should not be given to men who
who through good report and won prizesatschool in Birmingham, but who know evil report has remained steadfast to his He was nothing of climatic conditions out bere nor any-belief in the future of Hongkong. thing of the tropics, or what kind of buildings | derided for his Praya Reclamation Scheme, are best adapted for life in this part of the but the Whirligig of Time brings its revenges; world. From what I heard when the plans he was right, and time has nobly vindicated him. first came out I formed the idea that the court- Need I say that I refer to the senior unofficial room, as designed, would be about as light member, the member for the justices? In the and airy as the Black Hole of Calcutta. far off years to come, when this Council and all I know that the Government architect denies connected with it shall have vanished from this this, but I do not think that that gentleman earthly plane into the limbo of things forgotten, had come to the Colony when those plans first they will take the globe-trotter down to our arrived. As for the Post Office, we paid an new Fraya, and they will show him the build- enormous sum of half a million dollars, or $20 a ings which have lately sprung up there, and foot. if I remember rightly, for the site: and I they will say of Sir Paul Chater, as was said can see no reason why we should not utilise the once before of another noble knight, like him, ground for all it is worth and get all we can out a mighty workman in bricks and mortar, Si of it by putting up another storey and putting monumentum quæris, circumspice. the Harbour Master and all his works into it. He would have a fine view of the harbour; he would be in a much pleasanter situation than he is at present. It would be much convenient for shipping people and the ship. ping firms; and last. but not least, the Colonial Treasurer could eke out the Budget with the proceeds of the sale of the old site, which must be very valuable. I think we in Hongkong suffer from two things. partly from want of taste and still more from lack of imagination. If there were a name that was endeared to all old residents by old memories and associations it was Pedder's Wharf, and it was snobbery and toadyism to alter it to Blake Pier. In the old days Pedder's Wharf was, and still is, the centre of the life of the harbour. little was the starting point of all our It expeditions and adventures to the mainland. and of all our picnics and bathing parties; it commemorated the name of a naval officer who had rendered good services in his time to his Queen and this Colony, and if it were necessary to advertise the name of any particular official there were surely plenty of new buildings and streets that could be used for the purpose. If the old name could be restored to us without offence I am sure the community would hail it with delight. but the wretched sycophants who were responsi- ble for this miserable piece of time-serving surely deserve and will surely receive the con. tempt of every right-minded man. of imagination, one has only to go through the streets of the town and see with what an absence of any care, taste. forethought or imagina- tion the place has been laid out. Somehow or other it seems impossible for us to look ahead and try to imagine what H ngkoug will be twenty years hence. I don't say that the Go- vernment are the only sinners in this respect; we the people are just as bad. We had so little foresight that we built the Hongkong Club on half the piece of ground we could have obtained at the ridiculous price of $3 a foot. A year or two afterwards we had to buy half the remainder at double the price, and had to build a bidge across the road to get at it. A little imagination there would have saved as a lot of money and given us a much better club. It may be too late to do much for Hongkong, but in Kowloon and the New Territory the Government have a
Hon. Mr. SHEWAN-I did not apply it to that gentleman. I applied it to the gentleman who advised the last representative of His Majesty to do that.
were
The COLONIAL SECRETARY-The distinc- tion, sir, is so fine that it can hardly be termed a distinction at all. The hon. member mentioned Canton coins and wondered why we did not restrict them coming into this Colony. I would like to ask him how he who seems greatly interested in the finance of the Colony- would like to hear of the Viceroy of Canton utaliating by prohibiting the flow of Hongkong coins into. China think our profit on subsidiary As for lack coins would very
rapidly disappear if
Не taken.
next criti- such action cised the system of granting 75 years' leases, and told us that this would depreciate property in the future in this colony. That is a cry that was raised at the time that the change was made, and all I can say is that the land sales ever since the change was made have fully justified the wisdom of making it. The land appears to be as much sought after as it was under longer leases. He next animadverted on the policy of the Afforestation Department, and all I can say with respect to that, sir, is that it is one more example of the innate aversion Englishmen have to anything connected with science. They do things in a bull-dog sort of way; but to do these in a scientific way they whatever. no appreciation He next deplored our expenditure upon plague and said they got on just as well in Canton
|
seem to
have
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