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G Williams Esq
Invest in Britain Bureau
Department of Trade & Industry
Bridge Place
88-89 Eccleston Square LONDON SW1V 1PT
35
BRITISH TRADE COMMISSION
HONG KONG.
20 November 1986
090/1
HKK
REC LIVED RIPEGIST
1 DEC 1986
Dear Garden.
The Chief Executive of the Strathclyde Regional Council Robert Calderwood, came to see me last week. He is anxious to help Strathclyde companies to do business in Hong Kong and China and, of course, he is also keen to attract investment. Mr Calderwood brought with him a Hong Kong businessman, Don Ferguson, who "looks out for" the interests of Strathclyde in Hong Kong. I have since seen Mr Ferguson again and he said Strathclyde may wish to open an office here. I urged Mr Ferguson to advise his colleagues in the Regional Council to discuss this with IBB.
2.
I
As there are already offices in Hong Kong working for the North East, Birmingham and Northern Ireland I do not see how we can object to Strathclyde. However, I am becoming rather concerned about the increasing number of regional offices. am able to see the present number of representatives quite often and to remind them, as and when necessary, of the sensitivity of the situation but a much larger number of offices could be difficult to control. In time, if more and more are established the total profile could exceed that of a normal inward investment campaign managed by the Trade Commission!
Will Rogers,
3. I have had another regional visitor. Principal Business Development Officer, Birmingham City Council, came to see me this week and he was uncharacteristically critical of the inward investment policy. He pointed out that the Americans, Canadians and many other countries were becoming even more active in encouraging investment from Hong Kong, and they were doing it in a very public way. I went over the ground with him and asked what additional activities he would want to pursue, supposing there were no restrictions. He had to concede that there was not much else. Already they held seminars and they advertised them. He mentioned that other countries were offering passports. I said this was most certainly not something the UK Government would do. He said he had seen the minute from Christopher Priston setting out the form of words that could now be used regarding absences by businessmen during the four-year period of settlement in the
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