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"Hong Kong is a Crown Colony and the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs is responsible to Parliament for the Government there. The Colony's constitution is contained in Letters Patent and Royal Instructions issued to the Governor of Hong Kong.
The Governor is both the representative of, and responsible to, the Crown whose views are conveyed through the Secretary of State. The Governor is
the supreme authority within the Colony However, the Letters Patent formally reserve to the Crown the power of disallowance of any Ordinance enacted in Hong Kong and the power to legislate for the Colony by prerogative Order- in-Council. Furthermore, the UK Parliament has power to legislate for Hong Kong by Act of Parliament.
3. The memorandum was published on 24 March this year as Appendix 5 to the Third Report from the Expenditure Committee for the 1975/76 Session (House of Commons Paper 270). While the statement contained in this memorandum did not make use of the term "sovereignty", HMG's powers in Hong Kong are clearly set out and the memorandum could be regarded as the most recent definitive public statement on the status of Hong Kong.
4. It has not proved possible to discover a public statement by a representative of HMG, whether in Parliament or in an international organisation or elsewhere, containing a clear assertion of sovereignty over Hong Kong. The research so far undertaken suggests that we may well have been as much concerned in the past as we are at present to avoid making a public assertion of sovereignty. In recent years, with the admission of the PRC to the UN and the improved climate of Anglo- Chinese relations, we have of course taken the view that we should if possible avoid giving offence to the Chinese by asserting our rights over Hong Kong. Thus Sir Colin Crowe's reply to Huang Hua in December 1972 was deliberately delayed in order to avoid any risk of spoiling the atmosphere for Sir Alec Douglas-Home's visit to China in November 1972. Again, the brief for the Chinese Foreign Minister's visit to London in June 1973 advised that if Mr Chi P'eng-fei made any remarks prejudicial to our view of the status of Hong Kong, the Secretary of State should in that case (but only in that case) put the record straight. In doing so, Sir Alec Douglas-Home was strongly recommended to confine himself to making the following points:-
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