CONFIDENTIAL
3
earmarking posts for filling by the secondment to Hong Kong of suitable DS officers, although there are limits to the number we can absorb readily, bearing in mind that it is in our joint interests that secondees are given jobs in which they can make a useful contribution quickly. Nearer the time we would wish to have details of possible candidates and an opportunity to interview them. My initial view is that the most suitable posts are those occupied at present by the two secondees from the Home Civil Service - Johnson, the Principal Assistant Secretary in the Economic Services Branch, and Shipman, the Principal Assistant Secretary in the Social Services Branch. Each has recently been given an extension of his original contract, so neither of these posts is now due to fall vacant till about June or July 1979. Another possibility is the Principal Assistant Secretary post in the Security Branch already occupied by a Diplomatic Service Officer, Denis Blain; but his secondment also is not due to end until June 1978. If this is too far off, we could have another look. We could also probably find one or two posts at our Assistant Secretary level - i.e. time scale Administrative Officers or in a specialist post if you have anyone with the right background and experience.
Para 8
See our comments under para 4 above. We feel that more use could possibly be made of older Hong Kong officers (particularly those on the point of retirement or recently retired) at least during the next five years. As regards the rapidly dwindling stock of HMOCS officers, you refer in para 3(a) to the fact that there should only be 9 such officers left in 1980 aged under 55. I presume you are referring only to permanent officers, but could not consideration be given to offering the larger number of contract officers some sort of career in the DS? Some of my colleagues have suggested, with appropriate diffidence, that the job of a Colonial Governor, even when constitutional development has reached an advanced stage, continues to require experience
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