Colonial Despatches

I have received your Despatch No. 59 dated 17 May, respecting the claim of the liquidation of the Queen Charlotte Mining Co. to a premium of £500 offered by the Government of B.C. in 1864 for the first 200 tons producedin in the Colony and shipped to any foreign Port. You state in your Despatch you have not felt yourself at liberty to recognize the validity of this claim, or to recommend it to the present Legislature of the Colony.

As at present advised I am unable to concur in this view. If it was desirable to offer such a premium at all it should have been made subject to distinct conditions as to the time for which the offer was to hold good and a vote for the purpose should have been placed on the Estimates, but I am unable to perceive that the absence ofany any enactment whether in an appropriation Act or otherwise absolves the Government and Legislature of the Colony for the time being from the responsibility (which in a general rule in such cases is accepted without question) for obligations entered into by a preceding Government and Legislature.

As the offer does not appear at any time revoked it appears to me that the good faith of the Colony is pledged to this expenditure, and unless there are other reasons than those contained in the papers before me which could be held to justify a contrary coursethe the matter should be brought under the notice of the Provincial Legislature.