§ 106. Mr. ORMSBY-GOREasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether the new shilling currency in East Africa will be sub-divided into pence, cents, or annas; if into cents, how many cents will be equivalent to a shilling; whether silver shillings will be legal tender to any amount; and whether the East African shilling will be identic with the English shilling in weight, size, and fineness?
Mr. WOODThe new shilling currency in East Africa will be divided into cents, a cent being the hundredth part of a shilling. The new shilling will be the standard coin, and legal tender for any amount. The size will be slightly larger than that of the English shilling, but materially less than that of the India rupee. The question of the weight and fineness of the coin is under consideration. I propose to publish a statement in the OFFICIAL REPORT showing the proposals in greater detail.
§ Mr. ORMSBY-GOREAre the new foreign coins actually circulating already in East Africa?
§ Colonel WEDGWOODHas this new shilling coin, which, for some reason unexplained, is much larger than ours, been issued in order to deceive the unsuspecting native into thinking he is getting the old rupee?
Mr. WOODIf my hon. and gallant Friend had studied my answer, he would have noticed I not only said it was larger than the English shilling, but materially less than the Indian rupee.
§ Colonel WEDGWOODBut why is it larger than the English shilling unless it is for the purpose of deceiving the native?
§ Mr. SPEAKERI think the native may perhaps be a little more knowing than the hon. Gentleman gives him credit for.
Lieut.-Colonel GUINNESSDoes the hon. Gentleman consider that a suitable arrangement to compel these unfortunate natives to carry 100 coins for every 1s. in view of the fact that they have no pockets to put them into?
§ The following is the statement promised:
§ The proposals for replacing coin by coin are as follows:
| Present Coin. | Sterling Value. | Future Coin. | |||
| s. | d. | ||||
| 1 | rupee … | 2 | 0 | — | |
| 50 | cents … | 1 | 0 | 1 | shilling.† |
| 25 | cents … | 0 | 6 | 50 | cents.† |
| 10 | cents … | 0 | 2.4 | — | |
| 5 | cents … | 0 | 1.2 | 10 | cents.* |
| — | 0 | 0.6 | 5 | cents.* | |
| 1 | cent … | 0 | 0.24 | — | |
| — | 0 | 0.12 | 1 | cent.* | |
| † New coins to be minted. | |||||
| * The old coins to be used at half the present face value. |
§ The question has been raised of the effect upon the holdings of natives in East Africa of the decision that, in consequence of the cent becoming the hundredth part of a shilling instead of a rupee, the present subsidiary coinage (1, 5, and 10 cent pieces) should be marked down instead of being replaced by new coinage.
§ The estimated face value of the coins of the above denominations in circulation is Rs. 1,074,327. Assuming that all these are in the hands of natives, and that none are permanently applied to purposes of ornament, the average holding of these coins for each of the 6,000,000 natives of Kenya and Uganda works out at about 18 cents, or, say, 2s. for a family of six, which, under the decision in question, would therefore incur a loss of 1s.
§ The reason for the decision is that, in a country such as East Africa, it is not an easy matter to replace one set of coins by another set bearing the same numbers but having a different value.
1245§ This confusion has to be faced in the case of the old and new 50-cent pieces. In the case of the 1, 5, and 10-cent pieces, it has been felt that the lesser evil would be to mark down the face value once for all, and by so doing protect the natives from the danger of recurrent frauds by the petty traders. There is the further practical point that the other and more important minting operations (i.e., for the new shillings and 50-cent pieces, which are urgently required) would be very seriously delayed if it were necessary to coin the very large number of millions of pieces which would be required to replace the existing small change.