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account, and to report the excess or the special expenditure in due course to the War Office for covering sanction.
13. Paragraph 24.-In War Office letter No. 266/Hong Kong/53, dated the 16th October, 1905, the General Officer Commanding was directed to consult the naval authorities as to the suitability or otherwise of the conditions under which it is proposed to admit torpedo craft to the port when the examination service is in force. Until these arrangements have received the concurrence of the naval authorities they should not be adopted.
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14. Paragraph 25.-The Committee are in entire accord with the views of the Governor. As pointed out in paragraph 6 of the Colonial Defence Committee's Memo- randum No. 330 M, which received the approval both of the Army Council and of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, the channel of communication for all instructions or information affecting the security of the Colony or its defences at the "precautionary stage and subsequently will be from the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the Governor, by whom all necessary communications will be made to the General Officer Commanding. In this connection it may be mentioned that paragraphs 22 and 23 of the 1904 Provisional Edition of the King's Regulations for the Army are under revision.
With reference to paragraph 9 of the Governor's despatch, and paragraph 25 of the letter of the General Officer Commanding, the fact that the Defence Scheme of a Colony is remarked on by the Colonial Defence Committee, and that the Army Council concur in the Remarks of the Committee, does not in any way affect the responsibility of the Governor and Commander-in-Chief, as representative of His Majesty, for the safety of the Colony, nor is it intended to fetter the action of the General Officer who is invested with the command of the troops, and is responsible for the immediate direction of the military operations. The Defence Scheme is merely a plan, prepared by a local committee assembled by the Governor, for utilizing in the best possible manner the resources available in the Colony. The object of referring the Defence Scheme to the Colonial Defence Committee, on which the Departments of State concerned are represented, is to co-ordinate peace preparations for war, and to ensure that experience gained in one part of the Empire in such preparations is communicated to other parts.
Letter of General Officer Commanding.
15. Paragraph 14.-The Colonial Defence Committee see no objection to the proposal that the 6-pr. Q.F. gun at Stonecutters West Battery should be used as the examination gun until the new 6-in. guns are mounted.
16. Paragraph 15.-The reallotment of artillery duties among the companies of the Hong Kong-Singapore battalion, R.G.A., is a distinct improvement. The Table D (iii), “Summary for Manning" is a useful addition, enabling the distribution of the artillery units to be readily understood.
17. Paragraph 24.-With regard to the suggestion that the examination officer on each steamer should be regarded as a signaller, it must be remembered that it is contemplated that some of these officers will be officers of the mercantile marine, and that very few of these officers are at all proficient either in semaphore or in Morse signalling.
This proposed arrangement of utilizing the services of officers of merchant- vessels for the examination service does not appear to the Committee to be a satisfactory one. The conduct of the examination service is never an easy matter, and at Hong Kong is particularly difficult, owing to the vast amount of traffic to be handled. It is considered of great importance that the examining officers should be intimately acquainted with the regulations, and should frequently practise their duties at tests of the examination service. Special efforts should therefore be made to procure local men for these duties.
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