CONFIDENTIAL
taze
PF Ricketts Esq
CABINET OFFICE
70 Whitehall London SWIA 2AS Telephone 071-270
Hong Kong Department
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London
Dear Peter
SW1A 2AH
HMOCS: HOME CIVIL SERVICE
HKA 233/6
вр.
chased or sumpers comments 2111o
R&R pls.
Mer Stan
We're gol as for as we're going
September 1992
SECURITY VETTING AND RESIDENCE
all Air,
1
Arap
Thank you for your letter of 1 September.
35
14/
made
2. I will leave it to
to Adrien Stringer to provide substantive response to your paragraph 2. As a matter of existing general policy, normal residence requirements may be waived at departmental discretion provided satisfactory background checks can be overseas. I was making the point that the same general policy will continue to apply after the creation of the SARG. It is for the MOD to determine the extent to which they exercise their discretion.
3. I can understand why you wish to retain the sentence in bold type about vetting. My concern however, reflected in my suggested redraft of the whole section, was to avoid the risk of misleading anyone. Former HMOCS members who remain after the establishment of the SARG will not be "in exactly the same position as other British citizens living and working abroad" because, in a number of countries, reliable security liaison arrangements enable satisfactory vetting enquiries to be conducted through the host country. That will not be possible in Hong Kong after 1997. There are of course already a number of countries where security liaison arrangements are not possible and that is the more valid comparison brought out at the end of my proposed amendment. If it would help, I should be happy for this sentence to read: "Former HMOCS members and their dependants in Hong Kong will be in exactly the same position as other British citizens living and working in any other country where HMG does not have a security liaison."
4. It is true that most posts in the armed services do not require PV (S) clearance but the majority of posts do involve lower levels of security clearance, hence my use of the word "most". Again, I think you would be leaving yourself open to reproach if you did not acknowledge fairly explicitly the scale of vetting involved. Vetting enquiries at all levels require satisfactory security
CONFIDENTIAL
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