hmoc.let
By FAX
RESTRICTED
MJ C Waters Esq
Civil Service Branch
Government Secretariat
Lower Albert Road HONG KONG
Dear Drickael,
pea.
jaio
Foreign & Commonwealth
Office
HKA 233/1
270 2650
London SWIA 2AH
Telephone: 071-
HMOCS MATTERS
545
550
1. Many thanks for your letter of 24 September. My visit to Hong Kong is now confirmed; I shall be there from 10-15 October (and possibly slightly longer if my proposed visit to China later that week does not go ahead). I would welcome a meeting for you to bring me up to date on HMOCS from your side. I have today sent a telegram to the DPA asking him to arrange some calls for me, including a call on you about HMOCS. Perhaps you would like to have a word with Stephen Bradley about timing.
2. As to meeting Mr Cartland, I would of course be delighted to make his acquaintance, particularly in light of the expected consultations. But we would not wish any such contact to be misconstrued as consultation in itself. Mr Goodlad met the HMOCS Association during his recent visit and I would have nothing to add, while discussions are continuing in Whitehall, to what he said then. If Mr Cartland asks for a meeting therefore, could you suggest perhaps that we might have a word over a drink or a cup of tea. The keynote should be a social encounter, rather than a "meeting" as such. I am in any case still absorbing the brief, so Mr Cartland should be warned that I shall very much be in "listening mode" and will not have anything new to say. If he would rather not meet on that basis, I shall understand.
Yours ever, John
J C Morris
Hong Kong Department 1 October 1992