CON 064/1
GKU 064/412/1
R Parkinson Esq
Consular Department
CONFIDENTIAL
Foreign & Commonwealth Office
Lon on SW1
HKIL 040/1
RECEIVED IN REZ
YO. 51
14 AUG 1978
**
DESK OFF. INDEX
PA
REGISTRY Action Ten
August 1978
VICO: THE BRITISH COMMUNITY AND CONTINGENCY PLANNING
rek March has asked me to reply to your letter of 21 July. aile we have not been idle on this subject since receiving Peter Windle's letter of 14 October 1977, our failure to send an interim reply was quite inexcusable and I hope you will accept my apologies.
2. From the outset our main problem has been the lack of up to date information on the size of the community for which we are responsible. During the past 6 months we have carried out an cxercise aimed at bringing our register of British subjects resident in Macao up to date. This involved a series of advertisements in the local (Macao) press and issuing letters to each of the 114 persons who had registered with us since 1974. The Inspectors when they were here in June agreed that we would have to assume that those who failed to respond by the end of June were no longer in Macao. We gave them an extra month and the attached list represents the result of the exercise.
3. 11 of the adults on the list have the status of British subject, citizen of the United Kingdom and Colonies in their passports but fewer than 20, including children, could be described as UK patrials from the evidence supplied by them on their registration cards. The others hold passports issued by the Hong Kong Government.
4. If we were to ask the Macao police for the number of British subjects in their records, I am quite certain that as in 1974 Le figure would be considerably higher than our 65 because it would include Hong Kong Chinese who would never think of responding to an invitation to register with us in Hong Kong. I take it that you would not expect us to do this.
5. On contingency planning, we have introduced the subject to the Security Branch or the Hong Kong Government whose assistance would be needed in the event of an evacuation from Macao. It appears there has never been any contingency planning for such an eventuality and it of course raises the whole question of
We have also been in responsibility for Hong Kong belongers.
CONFIDENTIAL
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