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DIEU E
11 August 1992
SP Day Esq
British Trade Commission
Hong Kong
Dear Stephen,
Foreign & Commonwealth
Office
London SWIA 2AH
Telephone: 071-
BRITISH NATIONALITY SCHEME
1. I am very sorry that you have not had an earlier reply to your letter of 9 June to Nigel Cox. This was mislaid because of an administrative foul-up in my section. There is no excuse, I can only apologise.
2. You raised a number of points about your responsibilities in the Governor's Steering Committee on the British Nationality Scheme. I will try to answer these in the same order that you put them.
The
3. You are quite right in thinking that you do not represent the British Government in any official capacity on the Steering Committee. As you say your role is not to represent either the Home Secretary or the Secretary of State. Steering Committee is an advisory body to the Governor and your predecessor was invited to participate in it in order to reassure British companies that their interests would be taken into account. But Ministers also saw advantage in having an HMG presence on a Committee which would otherwise consist solely of Hong Kong-orientated people. So in that latter, unofficial sense, Mr Heap's description is not altogether incorrect.
4.
We were unaware that the Advisory Committee on British undertakings had been formally disbanded. We are certainly in favour of keeping it in existence for the reasons you give. However we assume this need only be on an ad hoc basis as we understand the members of the Committee were dismayed at the amount of work involved, and may not relish the prospect of frequent meetings.
5.
A set of guidelines for the Committee was indeed drawn up in consultation with our Legal Advisers. I attach a copy. Our Legal Advisers considered this the best insurance against
let.day.BTC
JEB
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