§ MR. WALKER (Leicestershire, Melton)I beg to ask the Under-Secretary of State for the Colonies with reference to the statement in Command Paper No. 1944 that the Crown Agents are directly responsible to the Colonial Governments, for which they are the commercial and financial agents in the United Kingdom, by what means these Colonial Governments can in practice exercise any effectual control over the actions of the Crown Agents.
§ The UNDER - SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Mr. Churchill, Manchester, N.W.)The hon. Member will see on reference to paragraph 2 of the Memorandum enclosed in the circular despatch of 26th February, 1904, which is printed in the Parliamentary Paper he quotes, that the Secretary of State exercises a general control and supervision over the conduct of the business of the Crown Agents. This being so, he is, of course, bound to consider any complaints which the Governors of Colonies may make as to the actions of the Crown Agents.
In reply to a further Question the hon. Gentleman said if the hon. Member would bring under his notice any specific cases of complaint they would be carefully investigated.