SECRET
DRAFT MINUTE FROM THE SECRETARY OF STATE TO THE PRIME MINISTER
FUTURE OF HONG KONG : LEGISLATION
1. Our negotiations with the Chinese are proceeding well in terms of timing and we still hope to be able to initial a draft agreement by the end of September. We have been giving thought to the legislative consequences of this. I attach a paper, which I suggest should be considered at the OD (K) meeting on 12 September, on the
content and form of the legislation which we will need to enact
before July 1985. If the Sub-Committee agreed to the paper, I would
then seek the agreement of QL to the inclusion of a Hong Kong Bill in the Legislative Programme which begins this November and will arrange, in consultation with interested Departments, for instruc- tions to be prepared and sent to Parliamentary Counsel soon after the initialling of the agreement.
2. Parliament will have been given an opportunity to debate the
White Paper on the Agreement in December, before signature, and we
hope that the legislation will not itself be controversial. We propose to leave the more controversial aspects, such as the substance of the necessary amendments of the British Nationality Act
1981, to a later stage, as legislation on these points will not be
essential before we ratify. We will, however, have to legislate on
these aspects at some time before 1997, as well as arranging for
some UK legislation to be replaced by Hong Kong legislation before
that date.
3. The essential need in my view is to press ahead with early
legislation on the central element, namely, the divesting of
sovereignty, so that we can ratify by July 1985.
SECRET