/MacLehose
жата
Mr Donald
CONFIDENTIAL
Hien
огы
02615-
67A
Mr. Clift HKGD The Private office have now fixed
The PM's briefing for the week beginning for 131726 July. Possibly the 28 it but please
Prime Minister's Visit to China: Hong Kong
Check wilt
Miss Fenwick.
The PUS had a short meeting this morning to discuss. The following is a note of what I have been involved in since:
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I spoke to the Secretary of State in the light of the PUS meeting. He said that he would try to take the opportunity of the flight back from Rome on 7 July to speak to the Prime Minister before she attended the dinner at the Chinese Embassy. You have briefing in hand.
Aktuald
517
PA
see 68A
I spoke to Mr Coles as agreed. He thought that our working assumption should be that all this was new territory for the Prime Minister. He agreed that it would be sensible to play Lord Maclehose's farewell call in the way we had in mind. It might be useful for Sir P Cradock and Sir H Cortazzi to see the Prime Minister separately and alone while they were leave, but he would not arrange such a call for Sir P Cradock until after the conversation between the Prime Minister and Lord Maclehose. He agreed that
if that meeting went well, it could be followed by a pre-briefing meeting on the Hong Kong aspects of the visit at the end of July which would be attended by the Secretary of State and officials to be decided. If the/meeting went badly, we would have to consider how best to play the hand. I mentioned to Mr Coles that we were considering bringing Sir E Youde back at the appropriate time to participate in the prepara- tions. Mr Coles had some doubts about this, on the grounds that it might attract undue publicity and I left it that we would return to the point.
The Secretary of State then had a meeting with Sir P Cracock and explained to him that the hand would have to be played carefully to avoid a reaction of the kind we had recently had over Gibraltar. He himself would speak to the Prime Minister first, not in order to make a particular case but to give her an idea of how people were thinking. The next step would be the farewell call by Lord Maclehose. It was important not to rush fences. It was important that Sir P Cradock should see the Prime Minister before her visit but the timing and whether Sir P Cradock should see her alone or as part of a briefing meeting - would have to be considered in the light of the conversa- tions which he and Lord Maclehose would be having.
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CONFIDENTIAL
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