§ 41. Colonel YATEasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he has any official information showing that the Government of the island of Barbados has recently entered into an agreement with the Anglo-Mexican Petroleum Products Supply Company, Limited, whereby the company has been granted the exclusive monopoly for twenty-five years of supplying fuel oil to vessels calling at Barbados; whether any similar monopoly has been granted in any other British possession; and whether His Majesty's Government intend to ratify an agreement of this sort which would unduly favour in a British market the sale of oil produced in a foreign country to the prejudice of oil produced in the adjacent island of Trinidad and other British Colonies, and so tend to discourage the search for liquid fuel in British territory?
Mr. HARCOURTA Bill to authorise the Anglo-Mexican Petroleum Products Company to construct and maintain a fuel oil supply station in Barbados was introduced as a private Bill in the House of Assembly in October last. The Bill was passed by both Houses of the Legislature and assented to by the Governor. Section 13 confers on the company the exclusive right of supplying oil for fuel to vessels for twenty-five years, but this provision does not affect oil produced in the island. The King's pleasure in regard to this Act has not yet been signified, but I may say that I am fully alive to the objections inherent in such a monopoly.