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involved, eg regarding the divergencies between the JD and the Basic Law, during the airport negotiations and over the Court of Final Appeal. There was growing doubt among HMOCS officers about what degree of protection the JD would offer in practice. There was growing distrust about Chinese intentions. JD 78 said that "any provisions providing privileged treatment for foreign nationals" would not be maintained: The Chinese could interpret this in different
ways. Even without a definite violation of the provisions of the JD, developments in China could spill over into Hong Kong after 1997. The rule of law was not established there. It could prove impossible for police officers to remain in
service.
(b) The levels of remuneration in Hong Kong relative to those in the UK were irrelevant. They were set to accord with Hong Kong's circumstances. DS officers serving in Hong Kong also received high allowances to take account of local
conditions. HMG's reference to remuneration seemed to be
based on the well known envy and prejudice current among UK
civil servants towards their Hong Kong opposite numbers. any case a study of career profiles in the RHKP would show that police salaries were not exceptionally high.
In
(c) Changing UK public service employment circumstances were also irrelevant: government departments had also been hived off to the private sector in Hong Kong, and public servants affected had received fair compensation and safeguards for
their conditions of employment etc.
6.
Hong Kong HMOCS officers had always expected (and this expectation was reasonable) either that they would have a life-long career in HMOCS (by treaty British sovereignty over Hong Kong Island and Kowloon was perpetual; and the JD negotiations had begun with the objective of negotiating a
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