§ 42. Colonel WEDGWOODasked the Secretary of State for the Colonies whether, in view of the fact that Mr. Justice Feetham has been appointed to make recommendations to the Colonial Office on alterations in the constitution of Kenya, he can assure the House that an official majority will be retained in the Legislature until the natives are fit to bear their part in the government of the country?
§ Mr. ORMSBY-GOREThe right hon. and gallant Member will have learnt from my reply to the question of the hon. and learned Member for Orkney (Sir R. Hamilton) yesterday that the inquiry concerns only municipal government. The matter on which he desires an assurance does not therefore arise.
§ Colonel WEDGWOODWhile I am very grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his answer to the first part of the question, may I ask him whether he can answer the second part—whether he can assure the House that an official majority will be retained in the Legislature until the natives are fit to bear their part in the government of the country.
§ Mr. ORMSBY-GOREI cannot possibly commit future governments or Secretaries of State for all time, and this is a hypothetical question. The question of the revision of the Kenya Constitution is not under consideration in any way, and therefore it depends on the future as to when and how the Colony will eventually get self-government. It is impossible to make a statement to-day.
§ Colonel WEDGWOODIs the hon. Gentleman aware that, in re-organising local government in Nairobi and Mombasa, the question whether natives and Indians should have votes on a common register would have an intimate relationship with the question of the revision of the Constitution?
§ Mr. ORMSBY-GOREI should hope it would have no relation. It is not intended that this purely local question should in any way affect the Constitution or the franchise settlement come to under the White Paper of 1923.
§ Colonel WEDGWOODIs it not intended to give votes to the natives and Indians in municipal government affairs?
§ Mr. ORMSBY-GOREI have no idea whether the question is coming up at all.