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From The Minister of State Richard Luce MP
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH
10 July 1984
JtKK 01113.
RECEIVED 'N SEG STAY 13 JUL 1984
220
Jean
The Ell. At
Thank you for your letters of 15 June and 17 June, addressed to the Prime Minister and Sir Geoffrey Howe, enclosing a copy of an article entitled 'Political Changes and the Green Paper', prepared by the Association for the Promotion of Public Justice. As Minister of State with responsibility for Hong Kong, I have been asked to reply.
As you well know, there has been steady progress in recent years towards the evolution of representative institutions in Hong Kong. Elections to the District Boards were first held on a constituency basis in March 1982. The extended suffrage introduced for these elections was used for the Urban Council elections in 1983. In May of this year, the Government announced plans to increase the size of the elected element of the District Boards and establish a new Regional Council containing an elected element to cover areas not under the aegis of the Urban Council.
At his press conference in Hong Kong on 20 April, Sir Geoffrey Howe said that during the years immediately ahead, the Hong Kong Government would be developed on increasingly representative lines. The Green Paper, to which the Association for the Promotion of Public Justice refers, and which the Hong Kong Government proposes to publish this month, will contain proposals to develop the representative status of the Executive and Legislative Councils. By all these means the people of Hong Kong are coming to enjoy progressively wider participation in their own administration.
/While
Mrs E Elliott CBE
55 Kung Lok Road
Kwun Tong
KOWLOON Hong Kong
228