Registry No.
DRAFT
HWB 18/2
SECURITY CLASSIFICATION
To:-
Top Secret.
}
Secret.
Confidential.
Restricted. Unclassified.
PRIVACY MARKING
WIBIL 51-74 33
NOTHING TO BE WRITTEN IN THIS MARGIN
In Confidence
19/€
From
LORD SHEPHERD
Mrs. L.M. Jpegar, M.P., House of Commons,
S.W.1.
Type 1 +
Telephone No. & Ext.
Department
I am now able to let you have my further comments
on the representation by Mr. Burn enclosed with your
letter of 13 November.
2.
I should perhaps first of all explain that this is
not, as your letter suggests, a case of a firm meeting
difficulties in prolonged attempts to clarify their
position. The firm's problem lies rather in their
Overse
experience of Chinese workers whom they brought to this
at the employers' expense,
are
country, walking out or terminating their employment
before the completion of the contract. In his efforts
Λ
to find ways of enforcing the contracts Mr. Burn has
approached many public authorities both here and in
Hong Kong, but inevitably the gist of their advice has
been that a contract of employment is a matter between
the parties concerned, and that in the circumstances he
has described, no public authority has either the duty
or the right to enforce compliance with its provisions.
If either party commits a breach of a contract of
employment the remedy, if any, lies in a civil action
in the courts. I am sure that if Mr. Burn has
consulted his solicitor or employers' association he
will have been given similar advice and also that some
of the difficulties that an employer may expect to
encounter in an action against an employee in the courts
will have been explained to him.
13.