Foreign and Commonwealth Office London SW1
Telephone 01-
T W Aston Esq CMG
Senior British Trade Commissioner HONG KONG
102-447
Your reference
21/1A
Our reference
HKK 21/4
Dato
11 July 1973
LAFI
3
fill
Dear Tom,
MASS TRANSIT SCHEME
No
REF.
1. I fully sympathise with the cri de coeur implicit in your letter of 3 July. It is, I fear, true that there are some facts on which, for a variety of reasons, it is not possible to brief you. I am sorry about this but there is no way of getting round it.
2.
However, you can rest assured that neither the DTI nor anyone else has deliberately concealed from you any of the exchanges that we have had with Haddon-Cave and his officials. Nevertheless, Frank Glaves-Smith has kindly agreed to write to you separately with some further details which may be of help to you.
Meanwhile please do rest assured that what you are doing to win this very vital contract is fully appreciated in the FCO, and I am sure in the rest of Whitehall. There are indeed tricky points to be sorted out. The problem of the two contracts seems to have been dealt with but the need to match the credit terms offered by others still remains.
[Copy for Mr Glaves-Smith]
اسم المیرا
A C Stuart
Hong Kong & Indian Ocean Department
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL,