ENG-1960 — Page 380

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CONSTITUTION AND ADMINISTRATION

The laws of the Colony are enacted by the Governor with the advice and consent of the Legislative Council, which controls finance and expenditure through its Standing Finance Committee, on which all the unofficial members sit. Procedure in the Legislative Council is based on that of the House of Commons. The Minister of State for Colonial Affairs, the Rt Hon Earl of Perth, PC, announced at the end of his visit to Hong Kong in October 1960 that no radical or major change was contemplated in the present constitutional position.

The membership of the Executive and Legislative Councils is given in Appendix XII.

JUDICIARY

The principles of Common Law and Equity and the statutes of England as they existed in that country on 5th April 1843, except where they are inapplicable to local circumstances, are the foundations of Hong Kong's legal system. They have been extended and modified by the application to the Colony of certain later enactments of the United Kingdom Parliament and by the Ordinances of Hong Kong. The last consolidated and revised edition of the Laws of Hong Kong, correct to 1950, was published in 1951. The courts of the Colony are described in Chapter 13.

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ADMINISTRATION

Under the general direction of the Colonial Secretary, the administrative functions of the Government are discharged by some thirty departments, all the officers of which are members of the Civil Service. A list of these departments is given in Appendix II.

The Colonial Secretariat, under the general administrative control of the Deputy Colonial Secretary, co-ordinates the work of departments, and makes, or transmits from the Governor, Governor in Council, or Colonial Secretary, all general policy decisions. The Secretariat consists of four divisions dealing with general administration, finance, defence and establishment matters. The Financial Secretary is responsible for financial and economic policy; the Defence Secretary advises on defence, co-ordinates the work of the local forces described in Chapter 17, and acts as the main channel of communication between the Government and Her Majesty's Armed Forces stationed in the Colony. The Secretariat includes a Political Adviser, seconded from the Foreign Office.