4.
7
6. Dr Gama said that accession was of vital importance to
Portugal. Membership of the Community would help the Portuguese economy to develop and provide a political guarantee of a pluralist
and democratic regime. The present state of affairs under
which Portugal was part of EFTA and depended on bilateral agreements
with the Community could not go on indefinitely. There should be no
serious problem in completing the accession negotiations except
perhaps on the social affairs chapter and Portugal should be ready
to sign a Treaty of Accession before pain although they would join
at the same time as Spain. It would be helpful if the Athens
European Council could make a positive statement about enlargement since
the Portuguese Government were coming under increasing pressure from
the Communist Party and some sections of the business community who were against joining the EC. He asked whether Lady Young expected the
negotiations over the budget and the CAP to be successfully concluded
at the Athens Council. Lady Young said that we hoped that the Council
would reach a successful conclusion but the negotiations were bound
to be difficult. The Prime Minister had made it clear that we would
be ready to consider an expansion of the Community's
resources3· once agreement had been reached on the CAP and the budget.
The important thing was to reach agreement on a more equitable way
of financing the Community in order to avoid a repeat of the damaging
annual negotiations over the budget which had taken place in recent
years.
J 1
own
Hong Kong
7. In reply to a question from Dr Gama, Lady Young said that the
third round of negotiations with the Chinese on Hong Kong had started
that day (22 September). Our aim was to reach a solution acceptable
to the UK, the people of Hong Kong and the Chinese. It was important
to maintain confidence in Hong Kong and for this reason it had been
decided to keep the content of the negotiations strictly confidential.
8. Dr Gama said that the Chinese Foreign Minister had asked to see him
in the margins of the UNGA. He was worried that the Chinese might want
to discuss Macao. There was a possibility that, while the Chinese had at first been content to pursue the question of Hong Kong in isolation, they might now want to tackle the problem of Macao simultaneously.
He noted that confidence was decreasing in Hong Kong and that some
/businessmen