Compensation

Prospects Of War

Position in Solomons and G and E Colony

IT was announced in the “Crown Colonist” of February that the Governors of the Malayan Union and of Singapore had appointed joint War Damage Claims Commissioners, and they already are at work on the task of dealing with claims for damages to fixed property, or damage to, or loss, of goods, arising from the war.

It is emphasised that, pending the Co missioners’ investigations, it is impossible to give any idea of the extent to which it may be possible to award compensation.

The announcement is of interest in the South Pacific, because it has been ruled by the British Colonial Office that war damage caused by the Jap invasion of the British Solomon Islands and the Gil bert and Ellice Islands Colony is in exactly the same position, in relation to compen sation, as war damage in British Terri tories in Indonesia and the Far East.

The amount of compensation ultimately to be awarded is apparently contingent on the amount of war damage reparations to be paid to Britain by Japan; and that amount has never been indicated. If, as is expected, there is a gap between the total of Jap reparations and the total of the claims assessed, the British tax payers may be called upon. But that seems unlikely, now. Those taxpayers already are carrying an enormous burden: and the economic condition of the United Kingdom is not at present a happy one.