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II. The Purpose and Work of the Office. I think you will find it strange to work in the Trade Commission for two reasons. Firstly, circumstances are such that we do not have a normal relationship with a geographic department in the F.C.O. Secondly, the Government in whose territory we find ourselves is a 3ritish one, but one which is Britain's rival in many trade and economic matters, and which has many surprising turns of autono- mous thought and policy. You should not read into the latter sentence that the Colonial Government are in any way personally hostile to you; you will find them very friendly indeed. They are, however, single minded in their support of Hong Kong, and Hong Kong interests, and they therefore tend to treat this office on a level footing with all the other members of the Consular Corps.
On being posted here in October 1965, I was given no remit or terms of reference. The post was still de facto a Board of Trade one, and the Board's sole object and anxiety at that time was the very understand- able one of at least preventing the 1966 British Week from being a flop, and if possible of turning it into
a succes8.
I was the first Foreign Service officer to come to the Trade Commission. My predecessor had left some months before, and my colleagues were Board of Trade men who had all opted out. With my arrival therefore there tended to be a severance of the intimate liaison that had previously existed with the Board of Trade. At the same time I found it difficult to discern exactly which was the department in the (pre-merger) Commonwealth Office to which I should owe allegiance. They for their part had many more important things to do, than sort out the strange problems of an unusual small post in Hong Kong.
Once we had got British Week out of the way in March 1966 I therefore tried to forge closer links with the Commonwealth Office. The first step was to welcome the proposal that we should take over a lot of the Diplomatic Service administration duties which had previously been performed by the Colonial Government. This entailed my turning the Grade 9 Commercial and Administration Officer into a whole time Administration Officer, as he is today. It also caused our first expansion in Shell House. Under this new arrangement we gradually absorbed the work connected with all the
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