administered at the exporting end give the countries in question a vested interest in trade restrictions, as the behavioud of India and Hong Kong has dononstrated only too clearly. As your colleagues in CRE the late arrivals have been kept out and react with great bitterness. There is a good point of principle here too.
5
Many of the foregoing arguments were accepted by the then Frosident of the Board of Trade as valid when he came down in favour of a tariff rather than quotas. I see no reason why our Ministers should take a different view and it is for that reason that I have been urging you at this fairly critical juncture not to get committed to the Hong Kong line. The Governor's two telegrams show that the Hong Kong objective is to get the LTA extended where it suits them to do so and they know as well as we do that "roll-in" is the best way to bring this about.
know
S. STEWART,
Ha, CT1,
24 April 1970.