CONFIDENTIAL
Background
5 As the Minister will recall, the British Nationality (Hong Kong) Act provides for the grant of British citizenship to 50,000 key personnel from the Hong Kong private and public sectors, and to their spouses and children under 18. A maximum of 35 points, are available to people for service with a 'British' undertaking. (A possible overall maximum for the scheme as a whole would be 800 points.
The Governor of Hong Kong is legally responsible for determining what is a British firm and an Advisory Group on British Undertakings has been established with the remit of drawing up a list of approved British undertakings, which, after approval by the Governor, will enable the Hong Kong Immigration Department to process applications.
7
The Group is chaired by Mr Peter Heap, Senior British Trade Commissioner in Hong Kong, and its membership is drawn from senior members of the British business community in Hong Kong (list at Annex A). The broad criteria which the Group is using for qualification under the Act are attached at Annex B. The DTI and FCO have been asked to endorse the recommendations before they are finally put to the Governor for approval.
8 The Advisory Group had its first meeting at the end of November and has so far submitted approximately 500 companies to DTI and FCO for endorsement. From information available in the UK we have been able to confirm that the vast majority of these, or their parent companies, are registered in the UK. Others (like the British Tourist Authority and the Scottish Development Agency) are self-evidently British. Only in a few cases have we had to leave the decision entirely to Hong Kong because all the relevant information is held there.
9 The FCO Legal Advisers have defined HMG's responsibility as being to satisfy itself that the proposed British undertakings on the list have close connections with the UK. They advise that it would not be necessary in law for us to check each recommendation but simply to understand on what basis the Advisory Group had made their recommendations and agree that such criteria seemed reasonable. The Group has therefore been asked to provide a consolidated list of proposed British undertakings which show which of the criteria (as in Annex B) relate to each of the recommendations.
Ionel Come.
DAVID LOVE