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Kong. They have no difficulty on substance with any of the changes proposed (other than prior entry clearance). But anything which appears to restrict the rights of their citizens before 1997 needs careful handling. The Governor wishes to have the opportunity to present the changes in a way which will not cause unnecessary alarm or tension. It is therefore important that there should be no premature leaks.
4.
Presentationally, the case of the Swedish male au pair may be helpful. If changes to the Rules on au pairs are announced at the same time as those on WHMS, there may be less attention paid to WHMS; and we can say that since we had to update the Rules for au pairs, it made sense to do so for WHMs at the same time.
5. I now turn to the detailed changes (paras 19 and 8 of INB (92) 40). As I said at the meeting, we have no difficulty with "no-switching". On the other hand, you will not be surprised that we do not agree to prior entry clearance for all WHMs. The only problem countries whom we do not already subject to visa requirements for WHMS are Malaysia and Hong Kong. There are strong political objections to doing so there because of the real threat to substantial British interests. You will recall the Malaysian "Buy British last" campaign in the 1980s. I have already mentioned the delicate position in Hong Kong. There would also be some resource costs to us.
6. Nor do we accept that our eventual EFC obligations make inevitable the introduction of universal entry clearance. Long stay visas are national visas under the Convention and WHMS will either be in possession of the appropriate visa or have their passports stamped with the necessary endorsement on arrival. Both will serve for the purposes of other EC border guards.
7. On the other changes, we fear that they would undermine the attractiveness of the scheme for Australians to a degree that would seriously damage relations with that country, which are already delicate for a number of unrelated reasons, and which might also give rise to Parliamentary criticism in this country. As you probably know, a number of British and Australian Ministers, not to mention other prominent people, spent time in the other country as young WHMS. However, we believe that the combined introduction of no switching and the departure requirement (para 8 iv)) should enable us to exclude most if not all of the problem applicants. For visa nationals ECOS would no doubt need some guidance on how to satisfy themselves that the would-be WHM was not likely to overstay, become a charge on public funds etc (and perhaps IOs for non-visa nationals too?) For the latter we would in any case probably need to produce a leaflet locally to reduce the risk
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