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CONFIDENTIAL
The GCBS have been telling us that charterers are reluctant to use
British ships in the area which could, of course, be extremely danaging to our valuable cross-trading interests and we have just received a letter from the President of the GCBS strongly urging that refugees picked up by British ships should automatically be included within the 10,000 so as to avoid the delays resulting from the present "case by case" procedure.
We would, therefore, like to say either in the statement or in the supplementary that we recognise these problems. However, we understand that the Foreign Secretary does not wish to publicise last week's Cabinet decision that the 10,000 should include those picked up by our ships. We would not therefore press for a reference to them in the statement itself but would like to see the relevant supplementary amended along the following lines:
"Masters of British vessels are well aware of their
obligations towards persons in distress at sea. We recognise that compliance with these obligations presents. problems to Masters and to shipowners. It is therefore our view that the so-called "first port of call" principle should apply and we hope that one of the results of the Geneva meeting will be to give further weight to this principle. If in any particular case the country of first call refuses to receive the refugees, we shall be prepared to consider accepting them in the UK"
If pressed In this event, they may have to be counted
against our new quota.