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for a term expiring after 1997. And finally I agree that,
even leaving all these considerations aside, such leases cannot
lawfully be granted (in the absence of legislation) for the reasons
indicated in Section I of the Opinion..
SECTION III
Leases for an indeterminate term
Everybody agrees that this is not possible in the absence of
specific enabling legislation and the question need not be pursued.
SECTION IV
Periodic tenancies
This is the new suggestion which Mr. Griffiths has made.
Basically, it is that, instead of granting a lease for a term certain
which will expire after 1997, the Crown should grant a periodic
S
tenancy say, from year to year
which would be expressed not to
(except on certain specified and
be terminable by the Crown itself
limited grounds) before, say, 2010, though it would be terminable
Leaving aside the special
by the tenant upon the usual notice.
circumstances of the New Territories, there is ample judicial
authority for the proposition that such a tenancy could validly be
granted even though it was not possible, when it was granted, to
say how long it would endure. In the penultimate paragraph of his
Opinion (on page 11) Mr. Griffiths describes what he conceives
to be the advantages of proceeding in this way. He makes the particu-
lar point that, as he sees it, there would be no direct incompati-
bility with the Letters Patent or the 1898 Order in Council and
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