布政司署
香港下亞畢道
SECRET
本署檔號 OUR REF.: (44) in SCR 30/2091/74 V
來函檔號 YOUR REF.:
R.D. Clift Esq.,
F.C.O.
101A
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
НКК 3.4111
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY NO. 51
09 JUN 1980
DESK OFFICER
INDEX
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89.6
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Taken
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30 May 1980
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Dear siste
Illegal Immigration from China
$3A
The Governor wrote to Donald Murray on 30 April and 14 May and there has been a recent exchange of telegrams (FCO No. 415 and, Hong Kong No. 686) about the contingency plans to strengthen the deterrent to would-be illegal immigrants from China by ending the "reached base" concession, not issuing evaders with identity cards and making their employment illegal. Your telegram said that Ministers had endorsed these proposals, subject to examination of the draft legislation.
2.
The plan, with the draft legislation, will be put to the Executive Council on 10 June. I enclose a copy of the paper which the Council will consider (and which you would have received in the ordinary course). I trust this provides you with as much detail as you need to comment on the legislation. You will see from paragraph 22 that we are asking the Council to approve the draft legislation and the operational plans as a whole so that all can then be held in readiness for implementation at ten days notice at any time in the future if the situation becomes
grave.
3.
—
The draft legislation is summarised and commented on in paragraph 8 of the paper and it will be helpful to have at least your preliminary views, which would presumably have to be telegraphed, to reach us before the meeting on 10 June. That the proposed legislation - in particular the obligatory carrying of identity cards and exclusion from employment, with penalties for non-compliance may seem pretty robust in the UK context is well appreciated here, but the population has always been registered ever since the last War and an identity card is widely used in many contacts already both with Government, banks and employees. However, without these measures, the ending of the "reached base" concession and attempts to enforce existing law would have little effect. And an ineffective deterrent as it would quickly be seen to be would be worse than no deterrent at all : it would bring into question the Government's resolution in this matter, about which doubts are already often expressed, and lead to an even greater upsurge of those waiting in their tens of thousands across the border once they realised that life would be going on much as before.
-
SECRET
/ para 4.