CONFIDENTIAL
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機密
XCC(76)82
Main Recommendation
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The Working Party concluded that there is a very close relation- ship between the function and procedures of the Immigration and Registration of Persons Departments (this is elaborated below), and that on this account the Department should be amalgamated with the Immigration Department. As a result it proposed that the Director of Immigration should become the Commissioner of Registration with an Assistant Director of Immigration becoming responsible for the Registration of Persons Division, which would include registration of persons, the preparation of Jurors lists and the pre- paration of the electorial roll for Urban Council elections. This recom- mendation is endorsed by the Secretary for Security and the Commissioner for Registration as well as the major users of the Registration of Persons records, namely the Commissioner of Police, the Registrar General, the Commissioner Against Corruption and the Director of Immigration.
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The Case for Amalgamation - (Paragraph 103 on pages 34-38 of Annex B)
Although an identity card was originally intended to be a means of establishing a person's identity only, it has become in effect a residence permit. This change has resulted from:
(a) the decision to issue travel documents to local residents
on the production of an identity card to the Immigration Department;
(b) the provision in the Immigration (Offences and Control) Ordinance 1958 (now repealed), carried on into section 62(1) of the Immigration Ordinance (Chapter 115) that, in proceedings against a person for remaining in Hong Kong without permission of an Immigration Officer, a person who fails to produce an identity card relating to himself, shall be deemed to have landed in Hong Kong unlawfully; and
(c) the recognition by the Governor in Council in May 1968 that "it is desirable that there should not be persons in Hong Kong with an identity card but no authority to reside or vice versa".
(Executive Council memorandum XCC(68)29 dated 28th May 1968).
This basic conclusion is strengthened by the current practice of with- holding the issue of an identity card to an illegal new arrival until his stay has been legalised by the Director of Immigration. (The Working Party has also recommended legislative amendments to give this practice legal cover - Recommendation 42 on page 33 and paragraph 104 (ii) on page 35 of the Report). The decision whether an identity card, which
CONFIDENTIAL
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