46
THE NEW ZEALAND GAZETTE.
[No. 4

Merchandise Marks Act.

Department of Trade and Customs,
Wellington, 4th January, 1899.

THE accompanying despatch, transmitting a circular issued by the Board of Customs, has been received from Her Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the Colonies, and is published for general information.

W. HALL-JONES,
For Commissioner of Trade and Customs.

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(Circular.) Downing Street, 9th November, 1898.

Sir,—I have the honour to transmit to you, for the consideration of your Government, a circular issued by the Board of Customs setting forth the modified practice now obtaining in the United Kingdom in regard to the treatment of goods passing through this country in transit for re-exportation, consequent upon the recent report of the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Merchandise Marks Acts.

It will be observed that the suggestion is made that the colonial authorities should satisfy themselves that goods bearing marks indicating British origin which arrive in a vessel which has cleared from a British port are really of British production or manufacture, and are not foreign goods which have merely passed through the United Kingdom.

I have, &c.,
J. CHAMBERLAIN.

The Officer administering the Government
of New Zealand.

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NOTE FOR COMMUNICATION TO THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA AND TO COLONIAL GOVERNMENTS.

It is thought that it may be advisable, in connection with the subject of merchandise marks, to invite the attention of the Government of India, and of the Governments of those colonies which have legislated for the protection of industrial marks, to the following extract from the forty-second annual report of the Commissioners of Her Majesty’s Customs, being that for the financial year 1897–98:—

“The Select Committee* further recommended that goods in transit should be exempted from the operation of the Merchandise Marks Acts. To give full effect to this recommendation, an alteration of the law would be required. But, acting in the spirit of the recommendation, we have, with your Lordships’ concurrence, adopted the principle that no examination of goods in transit is to be made specially for the purpose of scrutinising marks. Accordingly we now take notice of marks on such goods only if we meet with them in the course of examination of the goods for revenue purposes; and, as we are revising our transit regulations with a view to reducing to a minimum the opening and examination of packages in transit, the occasions on which, in future, marks will come under observation will be rare. As further recommended by the Committee, steps are being taken to ascertain what precautions may be necessary to prevent the Customs authorities in India and the colonies from being misled as to the origin of goods that have passed through the United Kingdom in transit.”

Goods of foreign manufacture may pass through the ports of the United Kingdom for places abroad in several ways. They may be imported into the United Kingdom, may remain there for some time, and then be re-exported. In that case the goods, on their arrival in the United Kingdom, are treated as though they were for home-consumption, and are subjected to full examination by the Customs. To goods of this class this memorandum has no reference. It refers only to goods that pass through the United Kingdom avowedly in transit, and such goods may be of two kinds. They may form part of a cargo loaded abroad, remaining undisturbed in a vessel that completes her loading in a British port; or they may be transhipped in the United Kingdom, and form part of the cargo placed on board in this country. In the former case they are not, and never have been, subjected to inspection by the British Customs; but in the latter case they have, until recently, undergone a certain amount of examination, and occasional detentions have been made of goods in transit that violated the provisions of the Merchandise Marks Acts. In future, as will be gathered from the above extract, goods entered for transhipment will very seldom be examined by the British Customs, and it seems right that the Customs authorities in India and the colonies should be made aware of this, in order that they may not assume that goods arriving in vessels that have cleared from a port in the United Kingdom must have been passed by the Customs in this country as satisfactory in respect of marks.

It will thus be necessary for the Indian and colonial authorities to satisfy themselves that goods bearing marks suggestive of British origin, arriving in a vessel that has cleared from a British port, are really of British production or manufacture, and are not foreign goods that have merely passed through the United Kingdom. As some guide on this point it may be well to remark that, according to the regulations of this country, when goods are reported and entered as in transit for a British possession, a transhipment certificate (in form annexed, usually printed on pink paper) is made out by the exporter or his agent, and, when signed by the proper Customs officer, is attached to the “clearance” of the ship. Thus a ship’s papers contain evidence as to what portion of her cargo has been brought from abroad and put on board after transhipment: and it would be open to the Customs officers in India and the colonies to inspect such evidence if they thought fit. The evidence would not apply to goods loaded abroad, and carried forward to their destination in the same vessel; in regard to these it would remain necessary, in cases of suspicion, to find other means of ascertaining the circumstances under which they had been placed on board a vessel arriving from the United Kingdom.

Customhouse, London, 4th October, 1898.

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Transhipment Goods. (Form No. 59.)

Customhouse, day of , 189 .
The following goods, having been imported per from , which vessel reported day of 189 , have been entered for transhipment on board the , for , Collector.

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Additional Regulations for Entry of Engineer Students in Her Majesty’s Navy.

Defence Office,
Wellington, 11th January, 1899.

REFERRING to the revised regulations for the entry of engineer students in Her Majesty’s navy, and for the entry of students in naval construction, dated at the Admiralty, 5th February, 1897, published in the New Zealand Gazette No. 47, of the 20th May, 1898, page 1070, the following additional regulations, dated at the Admiralty, 27th May, 1898, are republished for general information.

T. THOMPSON.

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NEW SCHEME OF EXAMINATION; AND LIMITS OF AGE FOR THE ENTRY OF ENGINEER STUDENTS IN H.M. NAVY.

(Memo.)

My Lords have decided that, in future, candidates for entry as engineer students are to be examined in the subjects described in the accompanying scheme of examination. The limits of age of entry will be as stated therein.

The regulations generally are under revision; but the new scheme of examination is published for the information of intending candidates for engineer studentships.

By command of their Lordships.

EVAN MACGREGOR.

Admiralty, 27th May, 1898.

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ENGINEER STUDENTS.—OPEN COMPETITION.—LIMITS OF AGE, 14½ TO 16½ ON THE 1ST OF MAY OF THE YEAR OF ENTRY.*

SCHEME OF EXAMINATION.

Class I.

1. Mathematics— Marks.
   Arithmetic: Including vulgar and decimal fractions, rule of three, practice, interest, mensuration.. .. .. .. 400
   Algebra: Definitions and elementary processes, factors, fractions, highest common divisor and lowest common multiple, indices, equations up to easy quadratics of two unknowns, and problems arising from them .. .. 400
   Geometry: Euclid, Books I., II., and III., with easy deductions .. .. .. 400
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   1,200

2. English—
   Handwriting, dictation, reading with intelligence, and composition, to include the writing of a letter on some ordinary subject, and the reproduction of a passage read to candidates 400

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The present maximum limit of age (17) to remain in force for the examination in 1899.