布政司署
香港下亞畢道
*** OUR REF.: BL 1/3141/73
* YOUR Ref.:
C.S. 41A
2
COLONIAL SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
16th April, 1974.
A.C. Stuart, Esq.
Hong Kong & Indian Ocean Department,
Foreign and Commonwealth Office,
Downing Street,
London S.W. 1,
England.
My dear Stuart
Petition by Mr. LAW Kam-sang
I attach a copy of a letter and enclosure which I addressed to the Secretary of State for Foreign and Common- wealth Affairs in respect of a petition to him by Mr. LAW Kam-sang. This does not, I think, require any further explanation.
What, however, is not explained in this correspondence is why this petition, which was received in July last year, has not been forwarded before now. This, paradoxically, was not because of lack of diligence on the part of the officer handling the case but a surfeit of it, coupled with inexperience and a compounding of errors. The case involves the activities of a number of departments; the New Territories Administration, the Public Works Department and the Labour Department; but unfortunately because of the way enquiries were made into the allegations set out in the petition only the first addressee, the New Territories Administration, was aware that a petition was involved. The Director of Public Works' views were required on District Commissioner, New Territories' reply and when these were ultimately received he brought up points which required further explanation from the New Territories Administration.
Unfortunately, in addition, the Secretariat officer involved did not bring his superior into the picture until he had extracted from the departments concerned all the facts which he required to prepare the draft submission to the Secretary of State.
of
All this is really inexcusable but you are aware of the pressure of work in the Lands Branch of the Secretariat and in these circumstances errors of judgment occur in the best regulated families. The chance of further delays this sort should be reduced by a new drill which has been laid down for handling petitions which involves the use of a new marking of correspondence requiring it to be handled as expeditiously as possible.
I have addressed you personally giving background information in anticipation of the queries which the Secretary of State can quite rightly be expected to raise.