The Secretary, Prime Minister's Department, has forwarded to me a request from the Administrator of New Guinea for advice as to whether the Merchant Shipping Act (Imperial) applies in the Territory of New Guinea. In submitting his request the Administrator writes as follows:

The Secretary of State for the Colonies in a dispatch to you of 22 December 1921 asked you to appoint an officer under section 737 of the Act to represent His Majesty's Government here; thus showing that he regarded this Territory as a place within which His Majesty 'has jurisdiction'.

The question arises in my mind whether this is our correct status, or whether we should not come under the class 'His Majesty's dominions' by reason of the Mandate regarding us as 'an integral portion of the Commonwealth'.

The distinction is important in this respect: If we are a 'place ... in which His Majesty has jurisdiction', the only portions of the Merchant Shipping Act which automatically apply to us are Parts I, II, and possibly part of Part III.

If we are a portion of His Majesty's dominions then Parts VIII, XIII and XIV apply in addition to the above.

Until I know how much of the Merchant Shipping Act applies, I am unable to draft our local Ordinance, which will be framed to cover all ground not already legislated upon by that Act and the Navigation Act.

The Mandate in respect of New Guinea was conferred by the League of Nations upon 'His Britannic Majesty for and on behalf of the Government of the Commonwealth of Australia'.

The Territory of New Guinea is not part of His Majesty's dominions but having in view the nature of the Mandate and the position held by His Majesty under the Constitution in relation to the Government of the Commonwealth, I am of opinion that New Guinea is a place within which His Majesty has jurisdiction.

Part I of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 is declared to apply to all places where Her Majesty has jurisdiction and consequently is in force in New Guinea.

The other Parts of the British Act either have no general application section or are applied to His Majesty's dominions.

It would therefore appear that, so far as the Act itself provides, only Part I applies to the Territory.

By section 14 of the Laws Repeal and Adopting Ordinance such Acts and Statutes of England as are in force in Queensland are so far as applicable adopted as laws of the Territory. Parts VIII and XIII of the British Act, being applied to the dominions, are in force in Queensland and consequently adopted in New Guinea under section 14 of the Ordinance. This adoption does not operate as an extension of the application of certain Parts of the British Act but must be regarded as an enactment of those Parts as Ordinances of the Territory.

In the preparation of the proposed Ordinance it would be well to repeal the application of those Parts of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 which are adopted by section 14 of the existing Ordinance with a view to incorporating those Parts so far as applicable in the new Ordinance.

[Vol. 19, p. 151]