Mr Clewley
Reference
ASSISTANCE FOR KAITAK AIRPORT
Please see the letter from Mr Haddon-Cave to Mr Laird of 31 December, which replied to Mr Laird's earlier letter of 21 December (at 10).
As I see it, this latest letter places us in an
extremely awkward position. Mr Laird in his previous letter expounded the reasons why aid was not forthcoming.
The fact that Hong Kong decided to go to Japanese & Italian
firms was fortunate for us, as providing ammunition for
our otherwise pretty weak argument for refusing help. However, Haddon-Cave's new letter exposes the crux of
the matter, i.e. the moral obligation of the UK to at
least contribute towards the cost of development of Kaitak when we gain so much advantage from using the traffic rights as a bargaining counter in negotiations.
However, we know that it is extremely unlikely that we shall be able to get other Whitehall departments to 'fork out' on Hong Kong's behalf. The alternatives, therefore
we have to choose between are :
(a) ignore the letter (as done previously)
(b) acknowledge in general terms (I do not know how -
there is nothing to say)
(c)
initiate a 'Help Hong Kong' campaign by sounding
A
the views of other departments, ie internally, & DTI & CDA
In the final paragraph of Mr Laird's letter he id
that HMG would be prepared to consider providing aseistanc if an urgent need were to arise & a specific case were put forward.' I suggest we initially sound the views of FPAD & A & TD. So long as we could be absolutely sure that
we would get the money, wecould then write back to Haddon-
Cave asking him for a specific new suggestion for aid.
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