Mr
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Sir D Watson Wayson
PS/Mr Royle
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL
Minister.
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HONG KONG: MASS TRANSIT SYSTEM
1.
The Secretary of State for Trade and Industry sent a minute
to the Prime Minister on 14 December.
Governor had let us down.
This implied that the
Mr Royle minuted the paper to the Secretary of State
through the Private Secretary (Mr Grattan's minute of 20 December).
As a result the Secretary of State asked for a list of the times
when we and the Governor had pressed the DTI to take action.
313 This was provided in my minute of 20 December.
HKK 2T+
1973.3.
•
Subsequently on 31 December the Secretary of State asked
for the draft of a short unprovocative minute to the Prime
Minister, summarising the recent course of events.
We can
certainly defend the Governor against the charge of doing
nothing to make known to all concerned the problems of the
situation in Hong Kong. Nor can he be blamed for the remaining
deficiencies of the Anglo/Italian bid. We may assume that he
tried to persuade ExCo to validate that bid. We do not know
what arguments he used or how hard he tried. We only know that
he failed. Given the personalities on Executive Council it may
be that no-one could have succeeded. Mr Walker's criticism is
too sweeping.
4.
I submit a draft minute which Mr Royle may wish to consider
CONFIDENTIAL AND PERSONAL
/before