ROBERT ADLEY, M.P.
HOUSE OF COMMONS
LONDON SWIA OAA
18th February 1986
Some weeks ago I accepted an invitation from British Airways to join a party of Members of Parliament on an inaugural flight from Manchester to Hong Kong. They invited me in my capacity as Chairman of the British-Chinese Parliamentary Group. The dates were subsequently changed and the revised date of departure is now this coming Saturday, 22nd February.
You may perhaps imagine my surprise when I received a phone call from British Airways in London yesterday to the effect that they had been advised by 'official sources' in Hong Kong that I am likely to receive a very hostile reception in Hong Kong and that I should be discouraged from making the trip.
It so happens that it was extremely inconvenient for me to have to go from my Dorset constituency late on Friday night to Manchester and thence to Hong Kong and I had in any case planned to fly on from Hong Kong to Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. In order, therefore, not to embarrass my Parliamentary colleagues or British Airways, but enable me to maintain the detailed schedule arranged for me in Malaysia, I shall now fly directly from London to Kuala Lumpur.
You don't, I am sure, need reminding of the problems I have had in the past in Hong Kong at the hands of some of your officials; I had hoped that the situation had changed. With the exception of one or two journalists, I have always been given a most friendly, courteous and interested welcome by the Hong Kong press corps.
My relations with British Airways are far too important for me to want to do anything to cause them embarrassment. My feelings, therefore, about British Airways being asked to 'warn me off'