operate. I assured them that the Government were fully committed to the proposal.
The second issue discussed was the repatriation of Vietnamese boat people.
No-one in Hong Kong involved in
the [involuntary]repatriation of Vietnamese boat people
Madal
takes satisfaction in what had to be done, but the result achieved was necessary. Having seen the camps for myself, I am more than ever convinced that return to Vietnam in carefully controlled conditions is preferable to camp life with no hope of resettlement elsewhere. Hong Kong has paid a high price for its principled policy of first asylum. We cannot expect them to receive this
year the same number of boat people over 50,000 that they received last year. There is nowhere for those boat people to go. The policy of repatriation is therefore the right one, and I hope that this may soon be endorsed by the international community. I am grateful to my rt hon friend the member for Aylesbury and the noble Ld Lord Ennals, for their thorough and expert report on the first 51 to go back. I would welcome monitoring by the UNHCR
and other agencies for future returnees.
Mr Speaker, no-one in Hong Kong seriously disputes the
validity of the Joint Declaration as the basis for Hong Kong's future after 1997. But confidence in the concept
of one country two systems was undermined by the events
of last June. The Chinese Government have reaffirmed
their commitment to the Joint Declaration. We must make
it work. Central to that is the extent and pace of democratisation in Hong Kong before 1997. This is a subject of intense concern and debate in Hong Kong and of discussions with the Chinese Government. Those
discussions are continuing and I shall not go into detail today. Our goal is to set in place a system
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starting