CONFIDENTIAL
5
And
So much for what we have been able to discover end read between the lines here. I am afraid that it does not get us very much further, and in particular leaves us very much in the dark on what next. Are we in fact to regard thic contract as lost and are GEC and others now concentrating on other areas? have the Treasury pullöd back from it so far as the financial provisions are concerned with a thankful sigh that in our present economic circumstances they do not kow have to carry the burden of it? Or are efforts still being made to keep us alive on the sidelines in case we are called back and is there some exchange going on with the Japanese?
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1
I am also being asked such questions as:
tip
a) Will this not affect the attitude of some British civil servants towards making efforts on behalf of Hong Kong? (A number of civil servants have voiced this fear).
b)
Is HG going to accept this "rebuff" from a Colony at a time when the economy is under such strain and needs all the export earnings it can get? (This is being asked especially by representatives of British business's who are beginning to feel a mixture of resentment and self doubt as a result of the patronisingly sceptical and often antipathetic local press comments about Britain and would like to see us bite back has bitten back on the two recent occasions Financial Times piece on the HTS of them.
c)
J
P
just as the Hong Kong Government
the Guardian articles and the when the British press has been "critical"
Would a subsidy by the Japanese Government not be a break of GATT?
And
Yes it
provable
if so will HIG not challenge it and will the Hong Kong Government, which relies so much on GATT in other contexts, be allowed to be a consious (even condoning) partner to it? Some journalists and, even, Sir D Clague have been asking this.
d) If the Hong Kong Government give a guarantee to the Japanese does this not mean that MMG may be implicated since it would presumably only come into effect in abnormal circumstances where the Hong Kong economy as a whole would be under strain? If the answer is that there is room to cover this by raising fares then why was this rejected as a possible way of dealing with escalation in the Anglo/Italian bid? Lever, prodded I think by Claque, is agitating on this
point.
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I am confiningmyself at present to the line in your helpful "Flash" Creda in talk- ing to press or "public". But this leaves unanswered all of the above questions. I am glancing them to one side at present by saying "it is early days yet - the real negotiations with the Japanese haven't yet started let us see what happens in them", or words to that effect. But I would greatly welcome it, and feel better equipped to play the local bowling if you could give me some indication (in whatever personal basis you like) of the reaction, mood, hopes and intentions at your end.
I have sent copies of this to Rob Fell and Andrew Stuart on a strictly personal basis partly because there might be a few points on which they feel able to offer comment and partly because I feel that I owe it to them to round off the exchanges that we have had over the past 18 months in trying to get this contract. I only wish that our efforts could have had a happier result.
CONFIDENTIAL
Happy New Year.. Yours.
TW Aston/comm
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