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described conforms largely to the European tradition. Hong Kong is unique and its political development will doubtless also prove exceptional.
8. There is nothing new in the idea that pressure for political reform in Hong Kong will be generated by the rise of a "middle class". But such pressures will surely have a crucial role in determining the future of Hong Kong. Indeed, perhaps it is on this area, rather than the legal implications of the year 1997, that we should focus attention, although it is also true that the two areas are mutually dependent. It is interesting that it was the expatriate rather than the Chinese community which seemed particularly worried about the significance of the 1997. But, once again, the people I met were not necessarily truly representative of their respective communities.
9.
The Programme. The programme of visits arranged for me in Hong Kong was excellent. I was pleased and a little surprised that I could keep pretty well to the schedule, with only very minor amendments to the timetable from one day to the next. The outline programme together with the details provided by Departments concerned are self-explanatory. The following points are also noteworthy:
11
a) I am grateful that the Acting Governor could find the time to give me such a full and useful scene-setting" talk. The final item on the programme was a further appointment with Sir Jack Cater and I was able to discuss some of my first impressions of Hong Kong. Similarly, discussions with the Political Adviser were invaluable in correcting some of my perspectives of the issues.
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The full day visit to the Border Area, in the company of the De Police Gommissioner (New Territories), was particularly useful. It included a tour along the whole of the land border from East to West, taking in Sha Tau Kok, Man Kam To, Lo Wu and the holding-camp for illegal immigrants at San Uk Ling. All those involved in Anti Illegal Immigrant measures were waiting for Hua Guofeng's promises to take effect and the army were reporting the first instances of illegal immigrants' armed resistance to arrest.
c) The programme arranged by the Housing Authority was well-balanced. An effort was made to show me a representative cross-section of public housing which did not concentrate on "model" estates alone. Some of the residents I met, particularly in the poorer blocks, were suspiciously forthcoming in their gratitude towards and support for the Housing Authority. The selection of such tenants for me to meet was unavoidable. I made it clear that I felt privileged to be invited into their homes.
d) I was impressed by the way in which City District Officers tackled their work and the relationships they fostered and maintained within the community through Area and Mutual Aid Committees. Although I met representatives of these Committees, in the short time available, I really could not judge how well they operate.
e)/
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e) The surprise at the end of the day's visit arranged by the New Territories Administration was a meeting with the Heung Yee Kuk. The Chairman of the Kuk wasted no opportunity in raising once again points he had made to Sir Paul Bryan. I fielded these as best I could in sympathetic but non-committal terms.
f) I was glad of the opportunity to see for myself conditions within the camps for refugees from Vietnam. Certainly they appeared overcrowded, but conditions were generally less bad than I had feared. Whilst I was visiting the Jubilee Transit Centre the daily lists of those selected for permanent resettlement were posted on two notice- boards. In front of the list of those accepted for resettlement in the USA there was a large, excited crowd of about 70 people. In front of the list of "other countries" offers there was a solitary individual. Since my return to the UK, I have learned that more is being done to prepare refugees in Hong Kong for resettlement in the UK.
China
10. On 24 November, I travelled on the through train from Kowloon to Guangzhou. This enabled me to see something of Guangdong Province. The almost wholly agricultural landscape through which I travelled contrasted sharply with urban Hong Kong. There was little visible evidence of the much-talked about industrialisation or modernisation of the Province, except perhaps in the volume of road traffic (buses and lorries mostly, but a surprising number of motor cars).
11. One of the most interesting features of this leg of the journey was provided by my fellow-travellers, the majority of whom were Overseas Chinese or Chinese residents of Hong Kong. Almost without exception, each carried, in addition to personal luggage, the latest in television or radio receivers. As these are duly delivered to the waiting crowds of relatives at Guangzhou, one begins to realise how the magnetic attractions of Hong Kong are so widely broadcast throughout Southem Guangdong.
12. At Guangzhou railway station, I was met by a helpful young man from China Travel Service who escorted me to the airport. Our discussion ranged from Shakespeare (he had recently watched the Old Vic's production of Hamlet on television) to the numbers of British Diplomats who are regular Church-goers. Rather surprisingly (see para. 11 above) he claimed a general ignorance of life in Hong Kong.
13. Peking. Although an interesting programme of visits was arranged for me by the Embassy, a good deal of the time in Peking was spent making my own explorations. This suited me very well. I borrowed a bicycle for transport and found it relatively easier when alone to engage various Peking residents in conversation. Their curiosity focussed, reasonably enough, on life and spending habits in the UK. I was interested to find that even the regular and quite sizeable flow of European visitors to Peking has apparently done little to dispel the unabashed curiosity of Peking residents in Western visitors.
14. I had not expected the shops to be as well stocked as they turned out/
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out to be. Neither had I expected quite such a range of watches, cameras, radios and televisions to be on sale. A new phenomenon, presumably, is the individual on one street corner who shyly opened his coat to reveal several rows of watches which he wished to sell.
15. I hope it was purely coincidental that I arrived just as Renmin Ribao launched its campaign to clean up "Democracy Wall" and relocate it well away from the prying eyes of foreign visitors.
Plussts
PI Webb
13 December 1979
Hong Kong and General Department
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