to a review of unquantifiable costs and benefits
ch as those associated with overseas policy
options; for this reason the Report is rather longer
than it would otherwise have been, and its
presentation is to some extent artificial, for the
main costs and benefits are political and
unquantifiable.
The Report went to print on 15
November 1973, and is therefore already a little
dated (thus Grenada is referred to in the Report as
an Associated State but has since achieved
independence; the possible effects of increased oil
prices were not, of course, taken into account, and
some more recent statisticial material may now be
.available). More important, because this Report
was conceived within a PAR framework, it is directed
to the assessment of costs and benefits to the UK
rather than to costs and benefits to the peoples of
y
the dependencies themselves. In a different frame-
work the end result might have looked rather different
presentationally. But in my view it would not be
justifiable to devote labour and time to the
production of a second edition: the resultant amend-
ments would not affect the basic issues clearly set
out in the Report, on which early Ministerial
directions are highly desirable.
3.
Paragraph 10.10 of the Report summarises its
Briefly these are that except in the
conclusions.
case of Hong Kong, the British Antarctic Territory,
Falkland Islands Dependencies, British Indian Ocean
Territory and St Helena/Ascension Island, which in
our view it is in HMG's continuing interest to retain
as dependencies, we should now adopt a conscious polidy
2
CONFT DENTIAL
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