Textiles:
CONFIDENTIAL
Hong Kong and Ambassador Kennedy
Report on a visit on 6 - 9 June
3
1.
My visit to Hong Kong last week to give any help desired by the Hong Kong team in their negotiations with Ambassador Kennedy might look like a non-event in view of the postponement of the negotiations at Kennedy's request. But I thought the visit useful both to the Hong Kong and UK sides.
Usefulness to the Hong Kong side
2.
The visit was useful to Hong Kong in the following ways:-
(a)
(b)
They had themselves done a lot of homework on the American international trade statistics in textiles and on employment in the textile (including clothing) industry. I was however able to give them a paper prepared by CT division on the comparative states of the US and UK textile industries (excluding clothing) from 1963 to 1969. The Hong Kong side had already established that US international textile trade (including clothing) was broadly in balance and that employment had been increasing. The CT division paper showed that over the years the US industry had been, overall, much healthier than the British industry and backed this up with a mass of statistical data, drawn mainly from OECD sources;
I was able to give them a very full briefing on textile attitudes in the EEC, especially in the Federal Republic of Germany, as a result of my recent visit to Bonn. The Hong Kong side said they found this particularly helpful;
(c) I was able to have a very relaxed exchange of views
on textile trade policy, as a result of which they understand the British position much better than they did, particularly the thinking behind our ideas for a GATT study.
Usefulness to the British side
3.
The visit was useful to us, I think, in the following ways:-
(a)
As copied to this Depot. I Advisory Board.
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I was able to peruse the Hong Kong brief for the discussions, which had been approved by their Textile
(The Hong Kong London office has meantime sent CT division a copy). I was enormously impressed by the sheer expertise which had gone into
this brief, which confirmed my view that, when it comes to technical negotiations on restraints, we have absolutely nothing to teach Hong Kong.