BACKGROUND NOTE
THE TURNER REPORT ON LABOUR RELATIONS IN HONG KONG
1.
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In April 1975, the Secretary of State met members of the Labour Farty National Executive Committee (NEC), who were critical of the state of labour relations in Hong Kong. result, the idea of an independent study was mooted.
2.
As a
After discussion involving the TUC, CBI, NEC and Hong Kong, Professor H A Turner (Burton Professor of Industrial Relations at Cambridge), who had previous experience of overseas assign- ments, was chosen to carry out such a study.
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3. Professor Turner's terms of reference were to study and describe labour relations and to identify any impediments to the development of effective trades unions, employees' organis- ations and collective bargaining. He was formally commissioned to carry out this study on 4 June 1976, and was to produce an interim report by the end of that year. Following this he was commissioned to carry out more detailed investigations during 1977. He hopes to complete drafting his final report by April. He intends then to visit Hong Kong the following month for final discussions before submission of the report.
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4. No time limit was set for this second phase; but it was generally expected that the work would be completed before the end of 1977. In the event, this proved over optimistic. Professor Turner himself has been involved with other duties at Cambridge and Sydney Universities, and he has had problems with his collaborators especially when one of the key members of
He has also suffered from the team dropped out at short notice. intermittent ill health. While it is unfortunate that the report has taken so long, we are satirely in Professor Turner's hands if we want to be sure that the final report is a comprehensive, impartial review of the subject. The Labour Party National Executive Committee and the TUC both attach particular importance
to this.
15. Although