(885363) Dd. 896639 1,000M 8/71 St.S.
NOTHING TO BE WRITTEN IN THIS MARGIN
Registry
No.
"CURITY CLASSIFICATION
Top Secret.
Seeret.
Confidential.
Restricted. Hemifred
PRIVACY MARKING
..In Confidence
A
B
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CONFIDENTIAL
DRAFT
SUBMISSION
To:-
Mr Wilford
Sir Leslie Monson Mr Logan
Type 1 +
From
Mr Laird
Telephone No. & Ext.
Department
Hong Kong
APPOINTMENTS OF UNOFFICIAL MEMBERS OF THE HONG KONG EXECUTIVE AND LEGISLATIVE COUNCILS
1. An early reply is required to the attached
telegram from Hong Kong.
2. I attach lists showing the present membership
of the Executive and Legislative Councils. It will
be seen that all the Unofficial Members of both
Councils were last re-appointed on 1 July 1970 and
that in all cases their appointments expire at the
end of this month. This situation was deliberately
contrived at a time when it was expected that
Sir Murray MacLehose would have assumed the
Governorship by mid-October and would have had
some 24 months in which to make up his own mind
about the future composition of the Councils.
things turned out he did not arrive in Hong Kong
until mid-November and he is accordingly now
proposing that all the present Unofficial Members
of both Councils be re-appointed for a further
period of six months with effect from 1 January 1972.
This would give him more time in which to decide
upon longer term appointments and is, in fact,
in accordance with the suggestion made by
O
As
D
Sir David Trench in the course of discussions which
we had here with him and with the present Governor
in June 1971. It is clearly the most sensible course
CONFIDENTIAL
/to