FCOAMD
—KK 256 /1 RECEIVED IN REGISTRY
06 FEB 1986
DESK OFFICER
INDEX
SY Foreign and Commonwealth Office
faken
London SW1A 2AH
GT Morgan Esq
Management and Personnel Office
Cabinet Office
Great George Street London SW1
Кизан,
6 February 1986
HONG KONG: SECONDMENTS FROM THE ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICE
1.
to
Geoffrey Wollen has sent me a copy of his minute y ou of 31 January ab ou t his recent meeting with Keith Shipley of the Hong Kong Government's Civil Service Branch.
2.
I very much support the idea that we should assist Hong Kong to broad en the experience of
some of their high-flying young civil servants in the
proposed. From my own experience of such people, the departments which get them will be lucky.
way
3.
On the issue of the UK civil service finding places for expatriates prematurely retired from Hong Kong Government service, I fully understand the difficulties involved. However, HMG has a special responsibility for members of Her Majesty's Overseas Civil
Overseas Civil Service employed the service of the Hong Kong Government on pensionable terms;
and by the precedent both of previous decolonisation exercises, and of public commitments made by HMG to HMOCS during that process, that responsibility has extended to an undertaking that HMG will do what i t can to assist those prematurely retired with future employment.
There a re additional difficulties in fulfilling these responsibilties in the case of Hong Kong, since the Overseas Resettlement Bureau (a placement
service for HMOCS officers) was closed down, budgetary reasons,
in 1970; and the opportunities for transfer to other dependent territories are already few, and will be far fewer by 1997. As a result, it would certainly be helpful if we were able to respond
for
positively to any request from the Hong Kong Government that the UK Civil Service consider taking limited numbers of ex-Hong Kong civil servants.
CC
>
Mr Wollen Mr Trevelyan )
>
Mr Bastin Mr K Morris, PPD,
Tary Gelming
A C Galsworthy Hong Kong Department
MPO, Cabinet Office
FCO