At the end of 1971, 447 men were also employed on Ascension: 126 by Messrs Cable and Wireless Limited, 121 by the Department of the Environment, and 200 by the US Base and other interests. There is only one trade union, the St. Helena General Workers' Union, with a membership at the end of 1971 of 1,062. The main crops are common and sweet potatoes and vegetables. At the end of 1965 the market price of hemp dropped considerably and production ceased in 1966. The livestock population at the end of 1971 was horses 22, donkeys 657, cattle 821; sheep 1,407; goats 1,217; pigs 452; poultry 10,309. Fish of many kinds are plentiful in the waters around St. Helena but the catch is usually insufficient to meet the demand. Towards the end of 1965 a licence was granted to a fishing concern in South Africa to develop the island's fish resources, but the company has obtained very poor results. There is no industry. The timber resources of the island are so small that all timber for construction purposes has to be imported. There are no minerals of any kind. There were no exports in 1971. The main imports in 1970 were: motor vehicles £36,885; fuel oils and motor spirit £27,499; flour £15,400; meat (salted including hams and bacon) £31,967; beer and stout £22,785. Total imports for 1970 were valued at £472,540. The St. Helena Growers' Co-operative Society is the only one on the island. It is both a consumers and a marketing society and provides consumer goods such as seeds, implements, and feeding stuffs to its members, and markets their produce, mainly vegetables, locally, to visiting ships and to Ascension Island. The local market is limited and is soon over-supplied, and this together with the decrease in the number of ships calling over recent years has inhibited the growth of this enterprise. The only port in St Helena is Jamestown, which is an open roadstead with a good anchorage for ships of any size. Navigation lights are installed on the beacons at Ladder Hill and Munden's Point. There is no airport or airstrip in St. Helena and no railway. The total allweather road mileage is 48.6. Of this 39.5 miles are bitumen sealed. In addition there are about 18 miles of earth roads used mainly by animal transport and only usable in dry weather by motor vehicles. All roads have steep gradients and sharp curves. The Union-Castle Mail Steamship Company provides a shipping service to the island. In 1971 there were 15 calls northbound from Cape Town to Southampton and 15 southbound from Britain, by two ships carrying 12 passengers each. No cargo (except a small tonnage of frozen food) is carried by these vessels to or from Ascension or St. Helena, but four Clan Line cargo ships northbound (excluding two petrol cargo ships) and four southbound called during the year. A further allocation of funds has been provided for an extension of the development programme for the period up to March 1972, bringing the total allocation, since the inception of Colonial Development and Welfare assistance (now Development Aid) in 1947, to £1,395,000. The Development programme includes agriculture, roads, housing, extension of the electricity distribution system, teacher training, medical services, etc. A survey of water resources has been undertaken and implementation of the recommendations began in 1969/70. An Income Tax Ordinance came into force on 1st January 1954. The rate for individuals is 4p in the £ on the first £1,500 and at the rate of 6p in the £ on any excess of £1,500 derived from local sources. In the case of a married person who can prove to the satisfaction of the Commissioner of Income Tax that his wife was living with him or wholly maintained by him during the year immediately preceding the year of assessment there is an abatement of one-third of the tax. A personal tax of £10 per person is also payable by those whose income is above £466 a year and who do not qualify for the payment of Income Tax. Import duties are confined to a very small range of goods. There are also taxes on motor vehicles, shops and entertainments. Revenue and expenditure for the four years 1968-71/72 were as follows: Education is compulsory and free for all children between the ages of five and fifteen but power to exempt after the age of fourteen rests with the Education Officer. The standard of work at the Secondary Selective School is increasingly being geared to 'O' Level requirements of the London University General Certificate of Education. The literacy rate is 100 per cent. There is a free public library in Jamestown financed by the Government and managed by a committee, and a branch library in each country district. HISTORY The then uninhabited island of St Helena was discovered on 21st May 1502 by the Portuguese navigator João da Nova Castella, on his homeward voyage from India. He named it in honour of Saint Helena, mother of the Emperor Constantine the Great, whose festival falls on that day in the Eastern Church calendar. The existence of the island appears to have remained unknown to other European nations until 1588 when it was visited by Captain Cavendish on his return from a voyage round the world. Soon afterwards St Helena became a port of call for ships of various nations voyaging between the East Indies and Europe. In 1633 the Dutch formally annexed it but made no attempt to occupy it. In 1659 it was annexed and occupied on behalf of the East India Company but the first official authorisation of the Company's occupation occurs in a charter dated 1661. In January 1673 the Dutch seized the island but were driven out again in May by the English navy. A charter to occupy and govern St Helena was issued by Charles II to the East India Company in December 1673 and it remained under that company until April 1834 when it was brought under the direct government of the Crown by an Act of Parliament of 1833. Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled in St Helena from 1815 until his death in 1821. Longwood House, in which he lived, is an important Napoleonic museum; it is in the custody of the French Republic. CONSTITUTION An Order in Council and Royal Instructions of November 1966, which came into force on 1st January 1967, provided for: (1) a Legislative Council consisting of the Governor, two ex-officio members (the Government Secretary and the Treasurer) and twelve elected members; and (2) an Executive Council consisting of the Government Secretary and the Treasurer as ex-officio members and the chairmen of the Council Committees (all of whom must be members of the Legislative Council). The Governor presides at meetings of the Executive Council. Under this new constitution, Council Committees, a majority of whose members are members of the Legislative Council, have been appointed by the Governor and charged with executive powers and general oversight of departments of Government. A general election was held in February 1968, and in May 1972. LAND POLICY Individuals hold land either in fee simple or by lease. Immigrants require a licence to hold land. Crown land may be leased on conditions approved by the Governor. The Government farms approximately half the arable area, and either farms or controls some four-fifths of the grazing areas. Commonage grazing areas are made available by the Government to private stock owners on a per capita per mensem basis. There is at present no scheme for land re-settlement and no pressure of demand for additional land. The grazing areas have not sufficient watering points to allow their sub-division into viable smallholdings and the economic nature of arable agriculture is such as not to be attractive to smallholders. It is, therefore, difficult to envisage any change in the present system of land holding. GOVERNMENT EXECUTIVE COUNCIL The Governor (President) The Chairmen of the Council Committees LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL The Governor (President) 12 Elected Members Clerk of Councils: G. C. Lawrence CIVIL ESTABLISHMENT Governor and Commander-in-Chief: Sir T. Oates, CMG, OBE Treasurer and Collector of Customs: G. O. Whittaker, MBE Education Officer: Clifford Huxtable Superintendent of Police and Gaol and Registrar, Supreme Court: D. H. Thompson Acting Postmaster: A. E. D. Clarke Senior Medical Officer: J. S. Noakes, OBE Medical Officer: M. S. Khan Matron: Miss G. H. Sim, BEM Electrical Engineer: E. Clark Social Welfare Officer: F. M. Ward JUDICIARY Chief Justice: Sir P. Watkin Williams Justices of the Peace: D. H. Thorpe; J. R. Charlton, MBE; F. I. Gough; Mrs D. V. Ward ASCENSION The small island of Ascension lies in the South Atlantic (7° 56′ S., 14° 22′ W.) 700 miles north-west of St Helena. Its area is 34 square miles and the population at 31st December 1971 was 1,231, of whom 674 were St Helenians.* The island was discovered by the Portuguese on Ascension Day 1501. It was uninhabited until the arrival of Napoleon in St Helena in 1815, when a small British naval garrison was placed there. The island remained under the supervision of the British Admiralty until it was made a dependency of St Helena by Letters Patent in 1922 and came under the control of the Secretary of State for the Colonies. Ascension is a barren, rocky peak of purely volcanic origin, destitute of vegetation except for about ten acres around the top of the peak (2,870 feet), where Cable and Wireless Limited run a farm producing vegetables and fruit and permitting the maintenance of about 2,000 sheep, and 185 cattle and pigs. The island is famous for green turtles, which land there from December to May to lay their eggs in the sand. It is also a breeding ground of the sooty tern, or wideawake, vast numbers of which settle on the island every eighth month to lay and hatch their eggs. In consequence, Ascension has sometimes been named 'Wideawake Island'. Other wild-life on the island includes feral donkeys, goats and cats, rabbits and partridges. All wild-life except rabbits and cats is protected by law. Shark, barracuda, tuna, bonito and other fish are plentiful in the surrounding ocean. Cable and Wireless Limited own and operate an important telecommunications station which connects the Dependency with St Helena, Sierra Leone, St Vincent, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires, and through these places, over the Company's system, with all parts of the world. In 1942 the Government of the United States of America, by arrangement with the British Government, established an air base which became of considerable importance during the 1939-45 war. The United States Government subsequently re-occupied Wideawake Airfield under an agreement with the British Government in connection with the extension of the Long Range Proving Ground for guided missiles centred in Florida. A British Broadcasting Corporation relay station on the island was opened in 1966. Administrator: Brigadier H. W. D. McDonald, DSO TRISTAN DA CUNHA Tristan da Cunha is a small island in the South Atlantic Ocean, lying about midway between South America and South Africa. It is volcanic in origin and nearly circular in shape, covering an area of 38 square miles and rising in a cone to 6,760 feet. The climate is typically oceanic and temperate. Rainfall averages 66 inches per annum. The majority of the remainder being expatriate personnel of Cable and Wireless Limited and the United States base. The population varies from time to time as it is largely determined by the employment offered by these two stations. Possession was taken of the island in 1816 during Napoleon's residence in St Helena, and a garrison was stationed there. When the garrison was withdrawn, three men, headed by Corporal William Glass, elected to remain and became the founders of the present settlement. Because of its position on a main sailing route the colony thrived until the 1880s, but with the replacement of sail by steam, the island ceased to occupy a position on a main shipping route and a period of decline set in. No regular shipping called and the islanders suffered at times from a shortage of food. Nevertheless, attempts to move the inhabitants to South Africa were unsuccessful. The islanders were engaged chiefly in fishing and agricultural pursuits. The United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel has maintained a missionary teacher on the island since 1922; a number of missionaries had also served on the island prior to this. In 1932 the missionary was officially recognised as Honorary Commissioner and Magistrate. By Letters Patent dated 12 January 1938 Tristan da Cunha and the neighbouring unsettled islands of Nightingale, Inaccessible and Gough were made dependencies of St Helena, though as a matter of practical convenience the administration of the group continued to be directly supervised by the Colonial office. In 1942 a meteorological and wireless station was built on the island by a detachment of the South African Defence Force and was manned by the Royal Navy for the remainder of the war. The coming of the Navy re-introduced the islanders to the outside world, for it was a naval chaplain who recognised the possibilities of a crawfish industry on Tristan da Cunha. In 1948 a Cape Town based fishing company was granted a concession to fish the Tristan da Cunha waters. Many of the islanders found employment with the fishing company. In 1950 the office of Administrator was created: the Administrator is also the magistrate. The Island Council received legislative sanction through a Bye-Laws Ordinance enacted in 1952. On 10th October 1961 a volcanic cone erupted close to the settlement of Edinburgh and it was necessary to evacuate the island. The islanders returned to Tristan da Cunha in 1963, but a few have since re-settled in the United Kingdom. The Administration has been fully re-established and the Island Council reformed. The population at the end of 1971 was 280. A new Island Council was elected in November 1969 following the enactment of the Island Council Ordinance, 1969. The Council consists of the Administrator, three appointed members and eight elected members including one woman. The island is isolated and communications are restricted to a few calls a year by vessels from Capetown and an occasional call by a passing ship. There is no airfield. A wireless station on the island is in daily contact with Capetown. A local broadcasting service was introduced in August 1966. A radiotelephone service was established in 1969. Electricity was introduced in 1969 to all the islanders' homes. The island community depend upon fishing for their livelihood. The Company holding the fishing concession has built a new fish-freezing factory and the shorebased fishing industry is being developed following the construction of a harbour. The working population find employment in the Industry and the Departments of the Administration. |