CODE 18-77
287/A
CONFIDENTIAL
Reference...........
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Mr
M
Hong Kong Dept
VED IN RE
-5DE
DESK OF
INDEX
BRITISH NATIONALS (OVERSEAS):
REPATRIATION
1. Your minute of 6 November to Miss Kaye in this Department.
2.
The important thing to note about repatriation, as it applies to any category of British passport holder, is that it is not a Statutory right available on demand. A person who asks to be repatriated at public expense must satisfy a consular officer that (i) he is destitute and (ii) he has no recourse whatever to funds of his own or from family or friends. A British citizen with right of abode in the UK is automatically disqualified from repatriation at public expense if he is normally resident overseas.
·
3. It follows therefore that there can be no question of our agreeing to repatriate Hong Kong nationals from countries in which they are normally resident after 1.7.97. We would only do it now against an undertaking by the Hong Kong Government to repay costs and at the best of temas it is not a course of action we encourage since governments concerned do not always feel obliged to settle up. It is, I suppose, just possible that we might exceptionally agree to repatriate a destitute Hong Kong citizen given a firm undertaking by the Chinese government to reimburse us, but I can think of no other circumstance.
4.
Naturally, we should continue to offer Consular protection for Hong Kong BN (0)s in third countries after 1.7.97 and this would extend, in the case of repatriation requests, to contacting friends or relatives for funds or alerting the Chinese authorities as appropriate. This might go someway to taking pressure off the Singapore Government if suddenly confronted with a build-up of overstayers, but they should be left in no doubt that the responsibility for dealing with any such problem would lie with them.
11 November 1985
CONFIDENTIAL
D A Lloyd
Consular Department 213 7023