بيروك
Bu 2418
*2017
M Kingken
10
July. (1570..
13
い
B.
12
I am very sorry to have to raise once again the question of Hong Kong's imports into the United Kingdom of wide sheeting and sheets on which you exchanged letters with John Moreton a year ago. I do so because in our attempt to work out more satisfactory arrangements for the conduct of our relations with Hong Kong on the textiles front generally we shall have to deal with the outstanding difference of opinion between Hong Kong and ourselves over the question of growth in our imports of wide sheeting and sheets. Fortunately, this has become an academic issue in that Hong Kong's export performance in 1969 in the sheeting categories did not entitle them to more than one per cent growth in 1970 under the provisions of the Heads of Agreemen1 The Heads of Agreement will expire at the end of this year and we shall presumably have to consider suitable arrangements for the interim year between the ending of the agreement and the beginning of the tariff. I assume, however, that these arrangements will be worked out in the light of the situation in our own textile industry and having regard to the level of imports from Hong Kong into the United Kingdom in recent years and to our policy towards other countries from whom we import cotton textiles.
2. In all the circumstances I should be grateful if you would be good enough to look at this "growth" problem again, against the background of our relations generally with Hong Kong.
I am convinced that many of our difficulties with Hong Kong in recent years have stemmed from the belief in Hong Kong that we are not interested in the affairs of the Colony. As you know, perhaps better than anyone else, this is a mistaken belief. But anything we can do to reassure Hong Kong that we are, in fact, trying to find reasonable solutions to difficult problems will, I am sure, stand us in good stead during the coming months when we are negotiating with the E.E.C.
P.W. Carey, Esq.,
Ministry of Technology,
1, Victoria Street,
S.W.1.
14
(K.M. Wilford)
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