24 MAY '89 28:50
FROM COI TECH RADIO
TRANSCRIPT K SELECT COMMITTEE ON HONG KONG 24 MAY 1989
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PAGE.0-7/05
IR TED ROWLANDS:
It
I think we are entitled to push it a bit further
than this without having any invidious nature to it.
would be a matter of serious policy if in fact the Home
Secretary regularly over-rules the Governor's
recommendation in this respect. The implication is that
if we have granted 8 out of 499 applications, there has
been a rather heavy degree of in fact over-ruling the
Governor's recommendations.
That would be a serious policy issue for you if that
was the pattern. Could you just confirm or deny a general
pattern?
NR REFTON:
You are trying to get me, Ar Rowlands, to answer
hypothetical question. Let me first say to you that the
responsibility lies solely with the Home Secretary,
solely.
It is a false assumption on your part, if I might
say 60, the path that you were going down, that the Home
Secretary necessarily had rejected a large number of the
Governor's recommendations or views.
I repeat what I said to Er Bowen Wells. Please do
not think it implicit or explicit in my remarks that there
either has or has not been a major divergence of view
between the Home Secretary and the Governor on this issue,