Confidential
CABLE AND WIRELESS SCHEME TO PROVIDE WORK EXPERIENCE AND TRAINING FOR EMPLOYEES IN HONG KONG IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE UK GOVERNMENT STATEMENT OF 20 DECEMBER 1989 ON HONG KONG EMIGRATION
The Foreign Secretary announced on 20 December that the Government proposed to introduce a special measure designed to help companies and institutions in Hong Kong to retain their key personnel. For those accepted on the scheme, employment or service in Hong Kong together with a period of residence in the UK would after a total period of five years result in citizenship. The companies and institutions concerned would arrange secondments of key personnel for work or training in the United Kingdom for relatively short periods of time, thereby minimising any disruption to their work in Hong Kong. The remainder of this note sets out how such a scheme would be operated by the Cable and Wireless Group.
Nature of the Scheme
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The basis of the scheme would be arrangements under which a number of employees employed by the Hong Kong Telecom Group of companies in Hong Kong - a subsidiary of the Cable and Wireless Group would come to the United Kingdom for either work or training. the former case they would, whilst in the UK, work for one of the Group's UK subsidiaries. This would in most cases be Mercury Communications Ltd but posts would also be available in Mercury Personal Communications Ltd and in other Group businesses in the UK. In addition, it is proposed that some participants would undertake training, either at the Group's own fully accredited engineering college at Porthcurno in Cornwall or on other recognised management or technical training programmes in the UK.
Eligibility for the Scheme
All employees of the Hong Kong Telecom Group in Hong Kong would be potentially eligible for selection with a focus at junior management or professional level. A reasonably good level of spoken and written English would be a prerequisite for selection and an internal standard would be established.
Duration of the Scheme
The duration of work in the UK would need to be long enough to enable participants to make a real contribution to the job that they were given. In most cases, therefore, the period of time spent in the UK would need to be at least twelve months though this would depend on the nature or level of responsibility of the job. In respect of participants attending training, they would obviously be required to attend for the full length of the training programme concerned. It is unlikely that this would be below three months.