HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL -5 July 1989
2047
Kingdom Parliament which, ironically speaking, determines our fate. This I would like to do so much that, Sir, I hope you will excuse me if I were to direct the rest of my speech to the United Kingdom Government as if I were at Westminster. Any reference I will make to "you" is not, Sir, directed to you personally, but to them.
Hong Kong is an island ceded to the British Government. Here we were born and live under British rule on British land. You have, by a stroke of the pen in 1984, given our land away. It is therefore your responsibility and our right to ask that you should give us back a place of abode so that we can continue to live under British rule on British land if we so wish.
You have, by the Joint Declaration to which we were not a party, destined all of us to live in Hong Kong under communist rule on communist land after 1997. Because of our love of Hong Kong, the only place we know of as home, some had believed, and more wanted to believe, that the Joint Declaration may work. And for a while some were convinced, but most wanted more assurances before they would accept this as an alternative. But after the June massacre in China, even those who were convinced have clearly changed their minds. And I truly believe that I represent most of all those who live here to firmly request and demand you now to give us back that right to continue to live under British rule on a British land. And if Hong Kong is no longer to exist under British rule after 1997, you have to grant us the right to full British citizenship so that we can, if we so wish, live in the United Kingdom, our Motherland. If you still have any confidence in the Joint Declaration, you ought to have no fear that we will take up this right. In fact, your resistance to granting us full citizenship and the right of abode in the United Kingdom reflects your doubt about the Joint Declaration. Yet the more you lack confidence in it, the stronger is the reason why you should grant us full citizenship to protect us from communist rule. Your granting us full citizenship will in essence not only give us the right to live in the United Kingdom but will open up our access to the whole of the Common Market countries, all Commonwealth countries including Australia and Canada, and the United States. It will be a route to freedom and safety if life in Hong Kong is no longer tolerable under the communist regime.
The Foreign Affairs Committee report recommends "that the British Government should take the lead at the earliest opportunity in establishing the definite guarantees which could be put into place in the years ahead." I say to you that the right of abode in the United Kingdom is the best and the only definitive guarantee. I say to you also that the "earliest opportunity" is now before everyone leaves Hong Kong to secure a home of last resort elsewhere. If you will take the first step, and you should as it is your moral obligation to do so, in establishing this guarantee, then no doubt your "EC partners and immigrant receiving countries such as Australia, Canada and United States" may share your responsibility. With your failure to give us such a guarantee, reluctant as I may, I must advise the people of Hong Kong, and urgently now, each to seek for themselves a home of last resort even if they have to leave to do so. I do so because, as a legislator, my duty is with the people first and the stability and prosperity of Hong Kong second, although the two are so interdependent on each other.