CONFIDENTIAL
notified by the Hong Kong Civil Service Branch on
21 February 1989 that the "deadline for transfer to the
permanent establishment of the civil service shall not
henceforth apply to overseas judicial officers", ie the requirement of Circular 6/85 that officers would not be
eligible for transfer to pensionable terms unless they had first been appointed to the Hong Kong service on or
before 28 March 1985. The Secretary of State has,
nevertheless, concluded that, in view of the open-ended arrangement whereby overseas judicial officers will continue to be eligible to transfer to pensionable service, such a transfer will no longer make them
eligible to apply for membership of HMOCS. The Secretary of State has been informed that the Judiciary first
learned on 15 April 1992 that the restriction that the applicant should have been appointed to the Hong Kong service on or before 28 March 1985 was, in practice,
being applied to all applications for membership of HMOCS
even though the Judiciary had been informed, in effect, that Circular 6/85 did not apply to it. In these
circumstances, he has decided that applications for
membership of HMOCS will continue to be received from otherwise eligible members of the Judiciary if they were first appointed before 15 April 1992 provided that the applicant has been transferred to the pensionable service of Hong Kong and that:
(a) his application for transfer to the pensionable service is received by the appropriate Hong Kong
authorities; and
(b) his application for membership of HMOCS, contingent on his being transferred to the Hong Kong pensionable service, is received by the Judiciary for onward transmission to the Hong Kong Department of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office,