HC Deb 27 February 1893 vol 9 cc423-5
SIR CHARLES DILKE (Gloucester, Forest of Dean)

I beg to ask the Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether, by the existing Anglo-Malagasy Treaty, we have the right of searching any Malagasy or Arab vessels suspected of being engaged in the slave trade in the waters of Madagascar, and of dealing with such vessels and their crews as though engaged in piratical undertakings; whether there has been a distribution of French flags to Malagasy and Arab dhows on the coast of Madagascar; whether Her Majesty's Government have lately given orders to the officers of the British Navy to in no way concern themselves with exercising a police control over dhows in the territorial waters of Madagascar; whether an indemnity has been granted to the owners of dhows flying the French flag searched for slaves in Madagascar waters by the British gunboat Redbreast; out of what fund this indemnity has been granted; and whether there will be any opportunity of discussing the matter on the Supplementary Estimates?

THE UNDER SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS (Sir E. GREY,) Northumberland, Berwick

The answer to(l)is that we had powers of search under the Treaty, but under Art. 96 of the Brussels Act all stipulations of Conventions concluded previous to the Act which are inconsistent with it were repealed. By the Declaration of August 5, 1890, Great Britain recognised the Protectorate of France over Madagascar with its consequences. The obligations of the Brussels Act are imposed alike on Powers exercising Sovereignty or Protectorate. Great Britain, and all the other Signatory Powers, have recognised that France undertakes the obligations of a Protectorate as regards Madagascar, inasmuch as the formal engagement of the French Plenipotentiary to apply, as necessity should arise, the provisions of Arts. 30 & 41 to Madagascar was recorded, without objection, in a Protocol annexed to the Act. The Protectorate over the Island includes the territorial waters. (2.) We have no knowledge of any distribution of flags. (3.) The instructions framed and issued under the late Government to Naval officers since the ratification of the Act inform them that they have now no power to search vessels in the territorial waters of Madagascar. (4 and 5.) No indemnity was granted by Her Majesty's Government, but Admiral Kennedy spontaneously and of his own hand paid £10 to the owners of two dhows which were seized under a misapprehension by the Redbreast before the instructions were received.