CONFIDENTIAL
Hon R G B Bridge JP
Secretary for the Civil Service
Government Secretariat
HONG KONG
LAC
(20
26 January 1978
HKK 430/1.
7730. 61
27 JAN 978
INDE
See
25
(13
@
DISPUTE WITH THE SHORTHAND AND AUDIO TYPISTS ASSOCIATION
1. As requested in your telno 93 I am enclosing a copy of the record of the conversation between Lord Goronwy-Roberts and Mrs Cheung and Miss So of SATA.
2. Lord Goronwy-Roberts has undertaken, without commitment, to do what he can to bring this dispute to a satisfactory conclusion. His main concern in giving such an undertaking was to prevent this, relatively minor, dispute blowing up into a major issue in this country. Mrs Cheung and Miss So have been very successful in raising support for their case and we have already had letters from MPs and an oral Question in the House of Lords. The danger is that, those with an interest in doing so, will use this dispute to voice their criticism of Hong Kong, and will extend their criticism to cover other aspects of Hong Kong with which they disagree.
3. We are very anxious to do all we can to prevent this happening and I am sure that you share this desire. What we would like to see is the re-opening of negotiations with SATA with a view to reaching at least an interim settlement. Interim insofar as, if the root causes of the dispute persist, they could be referred for arbitration to the machinery which you are hoping to set up to cover the whole public service. We agree with you that this wider scheme is of such importance that this particular dispute must not be allowed to jeopardise its establishment.
4.
We have given a lot of thought to what form an interim settlement could take. Firstly, we feel that those involved in the dispute, should, without prejudice to any final settlement, be given the salary proposed under the restructuring scheme, if necessary without signing the letter of option, as Mrs Cheung described it. In addition, we feel that you could perhaps make a further concession, without creating a serious precedent; if indeed a precedent would be set in view of the isolated nature of this dispute.
15. Four
CONFIDENTIAL