Mr. Audland
ZEO 5/340/1
44
HỒNG KONG
E.E.C.
I have the following comments on the draft brief
attached to your minute to Mr. Gallagher of 4th August.
Faragraph 4(d)(1)
If, for
This might be spelt out a little to make the point that Hong Kong would of course wish for any general arrangements which were agreed for other CammonwealtƐ: countries.
emaple, the C.E.T. were applied more slowly in respect of
imports from the Commonwealth than imparts from other countries,
Hong Kong would wish to benefit. This is not quite clear from the present wording. (The same point seems to me to apply to paragraph 11(1),
Faragraph 5(1)
Again, I think that the clear preference they expressed for course (1) was on the assumption that they would share in
any general canoession received by Commonwealth countries on the application of the C.E.T.
Paragrah 7(0)
It might be worth såling after the second sentence "Germany was already under pressure, to which she was yielding, to extend the range of goods from Hong Kong which were subject
to licensing".
Paragraph 7(a)
It seems to me inevitable that, whatever negotiating
stance we adopt, there would be restriction on the re-export
of textiles from Hong Kong to the Community, if them were at
anything like their present level.
aragraph 13
I do not think that we should push the argument in the latter part of the paragraph too far. It might well be that in the case of sertain commodities, the existence of a specially
profitable U.K. market has enabled Hong Kong to quote very competitive prices elsewhers, I am not certain what is the relevance of the argument in the penultimate sentence of the paragraph. If anything, it argues for continued free access to the British market because of the danger that such restriction
might be imposed elsewhere.
/Faregraph 19