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PR 103/4518/67
Sir,
26
November 1969
Staff Relations in the Hong Kong Civil Service
The Minister of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, Lord Shepherd, has directed me to reply to your letter to him dated 7th June concerning staff relations in Hong Kong, to which was annexed the note of the meeting you held with Mr. Daniel Jones, M.P. in April.
Lord Shepherd sees no reason why after only one year's experiment the Senior Civil Service Council should be regarded as failing to provide an effective consultative body. Indeed he is pleased to note that on 16th June the staff side agreed to the continuation of the Council for a further period of at least one year, with only one minor amendment to its constitution.
The Council appears to provide adequate machinery for full and frank discussion of service- wide matters. At the same time individual Associations remain free as before to represent sectional matters outside the Council and individual officers continue to enjoy the right to proceed by way of petition. It is sometimes inevitable that Staff Associations which participate in joint consultative machinery of this kind have to sacrifice a viewpoint, even a sectional interest, for the general good and to avoid clashes of opinion which might otherwise result in a collapse of the machinery. Lord Shepherd feels that, after only one year's experience in Hong Kong, it is only to be expected that the Association and the official side taking part in the Senior Civil Service Council should still be feeling their way with this new machinery and
CHUNG ah-leung, Esq.,
President,
Hong Kong Chinese Civil Servants'
Association,
G.14, Main Wing,
Central Government Offices,
Lower Albert Road,
HONG KONG.
/gaining
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