§ MR. GREENEasked the Under Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether his attention had been called to the following remarks made by Mr. Pope Hennessy, the Governor of Hong Kong, when he was presented with the freedom of the City of Cork. He is alleged to have said—
I am enabled now, for the first time since I have returned to this country, to refer to what has passed in Barbadoes, and to declare that, in all my experience, I was never in a community where there was such deliberate oppression of the masses as in the community at Barbadoes;and, whether, from the information received by the Government, such a charge is borne out by the facts of the case?
§ MR. J. LOWTHEROur attention has been called to this report, and a communication has been addressed to Mr. Hennessy inviting him to state whether it is correct, and, if so, to offer explanations. With respect to the latter part of the Question, I may inform my hon. Friend that Her Majesty's Government are not possessed of any information which would warrant a statement that there had been deliberate oppression of the masses in Barbadoes.