IN CONFIDENCE
I enclose a summary of the Governor's main proposals. They fall into two parts. First, there are steps to be
taken straightaway to make Hong Kong's representative institutions more effective, and the Hong Kong Government more accountable to them. The Governor intends to separate the membership of the Executive and Legislative Councils
(ExCo and LegCo) so that no non-official members of LegCo would also serve on ExCo. This will end the arrangement whereby representatives of some political groups in ExCo
served on LegCo while others did not. It will enable both
Councils to perform more effectively by clarifying the functions of each. In particular, it will free all LegCo politicians to develop their parties and programmes free
from the constraints of ExCo membership. The Governor is
bringing on to ExCo some respected members of the Community
without party political involvement. He will also be taking other steps to improve accountability: he will step
down as President of LegCo and make himself available
regularly to answer questions there.
A new
Government/LegCo Business Committee will be established to
enable the administration to discuss the handling of its
legislative and financial programmes with representatives
of LegCo.
These steps are all part of maintaining effective
British administration of Hong Kong up to 1 July 1997, and
on these issues the Governor will therefore be announcing
decisions.
Second, there are the changes that will be needed for
the 1995 LegCo elections. I have previously assured the
House that we would continue to press the case for a faster
pace of democratisation. I did so when I met the Chinese
Foreign Minister in New York on 25 September. The Chinese
position remains that the Basic Law cannot be changed
before 1997, and that no increase in the number of directly
elected seats in 1995 beyond the 20 set out in the Basic
IN CONFIDENCE