"Effect" should be altered in the sense that this statement would be too vague to have significant effect unless coupled with agreement to action by HMG to allow for continuing powers of administration beyond 1997. This would be much the same as the proposal we made in 1979, except we did not suggest the Chinese need make any statement at all.
Para 9. The first sentence could be altered to read that option B would only have a significant effect if it opened the way to action by HMG on the continuation of administrative powers.
Paras 11-13 seem unnecessarily long and detailed about the technicalities of how to approach the Chinese in comparison with the compressed style of the rest of the paper.
8th October 1981
SECRET