Mr. Wid Mr. Br
+15
Reference..
2)
Kaitak Airport Hon Kong
You asked me to find out whether waiver of the outstanding balance of the 1959 £3m. Hong Kong Airport Loan would affect (a) the F.C.0. expenditure ceiling and (b) the aid ceiling.
2. The balance of the loan outstanding to date is £1.4m., the 1969 repayment of £200,000 being due on 1 October. Repayments are paid into the Consolidated Fund and are not shown as appropriations-in-aid of the Foreign and Commonwealth Services vote. They are not offset against expenditure included in the F.C.S. vote and Finance Dept. consider that if the outstanding balance of the loan were waived, the F.C.0. expenditure ceiling would not be affected. Treasury approval for the waiver would have to be obtained of course and it might be necessary to obtain Parliamentary authority by the inclusion of a token sum in the F.C.S. estimates. Finance Dept. would wish to be consulted on this point, since it is not immediately clear whether the loan itself was voted.
3. O.D.M. Finance Dept. tell me that loan repayments brought to account by F.C.0. do not affect the aid ceiling, which is in any case reckoned on a gross rather than net disbursement basis.
4. I conclude from these enquiries that if we wȧive the balance of the Hong Kong loan, Treasury should not insist that we make corresponding savings either in F.C.0. expenditure or within the aid calling.
ካ
Ĥ Cairn
W.Durkin
(Miss W. Durbin) 2 May, 1969.
(Hong Kong Appr.)
But 9 werd hardly add that a lov
work would weed
4 persuasist with
hard &
of hard
to to done to induce the Treasury
to wait the balance outstanding.
If this is to bo dons, it should be as
invignal part
ๆ
a major operation
in which
consistent
Last
made
a
15
to all "donors" to the package. If a