57711
CONFIDENTIAL
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Sir L. Monson
Local Government in Hong Kong
Mr. Royle has approved the action proposed in your minute of 24 July.
2. I now submit a draft reply to Hong Kong telegram No.457. For convenience, the previous draft submission, together with Mr. Royle's minute of 10 July and Mr. Hilton Cheong-Leen's memorandum are also attached. Your letter to the Governor of 26 June is at (8) on HKK 18/12.
3. I have not referred in the draft telegram to Hong Kong to the points of detail included in Mr. Hilton Cheong- Leen's memorandum because I am sure that the Governor will already have received a copy of that memorandum.
4. My own view is that it should be possible to establish a municipality in Hong Kong on the lines of the Singapore municipality before Independence. The Singapore municipality worked well as a separate entity. It had clearly defin functions, raised its own revenue and was administered by officers of the Malayan Civil Service. Elections were introduced after the war towards the end of the forties. There were, of course, problems from time to time over the demarcation of responsibilities between the Colonial Government and the municipality but these were not serious.
28 July, 1970
Гай
(E. 0. Laird)
Hong Kong Department
CONFIDENTIAL