BRITISH MEDICAL ASSOCIATION
TAVISTOCK SQUARE LONDON WCIH 9JP
Telephone: 01-387 4499
Telegrams; MEDISECRA London WCIH 9JP
Your Reference
Our Reference
EGT/HJR
Robin J T McLaren Esq
НКК 395/2
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY NO. 5T 2 9 DEC 1978
DESK
INDEX
No
Head of the Hong Kong and General Department Foreign and Commonwealth Office King Charles Street
London SW1
REG. RY
Secretary: E. Grey-Turner
Action Ten
MC TD MA MRCS LRCP
20 December 1978
(90)
Dear Mr McLaren
As I told you on the telephone, the British Medical Association has a large Branch in Hong Kong (with about 500 members) and next year we are holding our Annual Clinical Meeting in Hong Kong in conjunction with our Hong Kong Branch. The Meeting will be a big medical congress, taking place from 2-6 November 1979 at the Excelsior Hotel and Convention Centre, Hong Kong. We are anticipating that there will be an attendance of at least 500 visiting doctors and their families, the majority coming from the United Kingdom, but others from Australia, New Zealand and other countries in the Far East, including the People's Republic of China.
Perhaps I should explain that the BMA has often met abroad, for example in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Jamaica, Gibraltar, Denmark and Holland. But this is the first time that we shall have met in Hong Kong and it is therefore a rather historic occasion.
The Queen is our Patron, and we naturally hoped that Her Majesty's representative in Hong Kong would be willing to perform the opening ceremony of the congress and I wrote on 24 October 1978 to the Governor and said we would be very honoured if he would consent to open the Meeting on Saturday 3 November 1979 at 10 30 am. The Governor's Private Secretary replied on 31 October 1978, stating that, unfortunately, as Sir Murray Maclehose's term of office expires in August 1979, he is unable to commit his successor to any engagements following that month.
You will, I am sure, understand that this is a great disappointment to us and I am writing to ask whether you can lend your good offices to help in any way. Do you think that you could perhaps approach the Governor and ask him to be kind enough. to book this engagement provisionally for his successor? You see, if the new Governor is not to open our congress I
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