HKK 1/8
Reference...
121
Para. 3 of (10)
Mr. Cruchley
You
I am minuting this file to you in connection with X of (9) on the attached volume HWB 1/16. will see that in July this year Mr. Roberts, Attorney General, Hong Kong, was over in London and visited the office of the Parliamentary Commissioner.
2. Hong Kong have for some time been considering the possibility of appointing a Parliamentary Commissioner, but they have not as yet reached any conclusion on the subject. They have however, reached the stage of preparing a draft Bill, a copy of which was informally handed to us by the Governor on his recent visit here. The draft Bill, together with its accompanying papers, is at (2) on this file. As a result of a recent Parliamentary Question on the subject, which required reference at to Hong Kong, we learnt that a revised draft Bill is now being examined in Hong Kong at the level, although we have no idea of the stage reached in the matter.
3. During his last visit to this office, the Governor mentioned that he would appreciate the views of the Parliamentary Commissioner's Office here on the draft Bill at (2) and I accordingly referred these papers to the Parliamentary Commissioner Unit. Their comments are now given in Mr. Lovitt's minute of 20 December, and it is with particular reference to paragraph 2 of that minute that I am sending you this file.
4. It seems to me that if Hong Kong have already prepared a revised draft Bill, we ought to try and get hold of a copy before referring the matter to the Parliamentary Commissioner's Office.
If you agree with this view, you may also agree that the most appropriate way of going about it would be for a demi-official letter to be sent to the Attorney General, Hong Kong, as a follow up to (9) on the attached file. In this event, I shall be glad to prepare a draft for your consideration or for consideration by Sir James McPetrie. Unless Sir James is able to answer the query in paragraph 2 of Mr. Lovitt's minute about the "Notes on Clauses" of the Parliamentary Commissioner Bill, 1966, we should perhaps include a reference to this matter in the same letter to the Attorney General, Hong Kong, asking him whether in fact he has already seen the Notes, and if not whether he would like us to obtain a copy for him.
30 December 1968
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(A. W. Gaminara) Hong Kong Department