CONFIDENTIAL
Anti PA
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Mr
Adams
CC: Mr Clift
Mr Jones PS/Mr Ridley PS/Mr Luce
Sir E Youde
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RELENTLE
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Mr.
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Mr. McQuade Toser
Mr Day
Mr Ure
SED
WIAD
MCD
SAMD
News Dept
IN
1,
BRITISH NATIONALITY BILL
1. I have spoken to Sir Jack Cater, Acting Governor of Hong Kong, on the telephone about the impact in Hong Kong of the Gibraltar amendment voted in the House of Lords on 22 July.
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2. The combined meeting of the Executive and Legislative Councils was quite heated but with the exception of one or two members, the Councils on the whole agreed that the right approach was to 'play it cool''. I do not think, therefore, that there will be any precipitate action from Hong Kong.
3.
I told Sir Jack that from the strictly departmental view we on this side of the Office would work first to see whether Ministers would try and reverse the amendment. If this failed and there was no great hope that we could succeed at this stage until Ministers had taken a view, we would see what we could do to find some '' compensation'' for Hong Kong as regards nomenclature. If neither of these approaches worked, we would have to fall back on a renewed round of statements emphasising Britain's commitment to and affection for Hong Kong.
4. Sir Y K Kan had been somewhat bitter and saw the Gibraltar amendment as ''another nail in Hong Kong's coffin''. The Hong Kong media were making much more of the problem than either the Hong Kong people or UMELCO. Sir Jack thought it likely that Sir S Y Chung would make a strong appeal on nomenclature when he sees Mr Ridley next week.
5.
See Hil
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On briefing for the press we agreed that we should try to duck questions on whether the Hong Kong Government had made representations to HMG following the Gibraltar amendment. agreed also that we should take the line that the Nationality Bill dealt with a variety of complicated issues and that it would be wrong to rush into fixed positions before adequate reflection. We would add that the FCO were well aware of Hong Kong feelings about their British connection.
6. In conclusion Sir Jack said that EXCO and LEGCO were much more concerned about getting the nomenclature right so as to bring out the ''Britishness'' of Hong Kong than about reversing
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