PASSPORT CANCELLED

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 108, 3 November 1937, Page 8

PASSPORT CANCELLED

VISITOR TO CEYLON

ACTION BY AUSTRALIA

(From "The Poet's" Representative.) SYDNEY, October 28.

The Commonwealth Government has cancelled the passport permit to yisit Ceylon of Mark Bracegirdle, twenty-five-year-old Australian, who is now in the position of being a British subject in Ceylon without permission. The Government's action is a sequel to a conflict between Bracegirdle and the Governor of Ceylon over Bracegirdle's activities for the Sama-Samaja (the Labour Party of Ceylon). Bracegirdle has been fighting a deportation order made against him by the Governor of Ceylon. Bracegirdle's mother, Mrs. I. M. Hoeker, now living in' Sydney, said that her son wanted to stay in Ceylon. She intends to instruct solicitors in Sydney to take action on behalf of her son to set aside the Government's cancellation order. "It. seems unfair for the Australian Government to intervene against Mark, who is an Australian,'on behalf of another Government," said Mrs. Hoeker. Bracegirdle was issued with a pass-' port in Sydney in March, 1936, available for all British Dominions. In December, 1936, he finished his apprenticeship to a tea planter, and spoke at meetings for the Sama-Samaja. Following this, the Governor ordered his deportation. Bracegirdle defied the order and evaded capture for some time before he could be arrested. Habeas corpus proceedings were taken in the Ceylon High Court for his release. Meanwhile, the Ceylon Senate censured the Governor's action, and recommended that the police officials who had arrested Bracegirdle should be dismissed,. It was after this that Bracegirdle was informed that the Commonwealth Government had cancelled his passport to visit Ceylon. It is still valid for other British Dominions. "■:■ ■ '