CONFIDENTIAL
HKB
301/1 INREGISTRY
RECE TO INREGISTRY
29
From:
PA
O Hum
REGISTRY Action Taken
dicate?
(Media) (65)
17/3
н in Mani
M
Date: 16 March 1993
CC:
PS
Brave Макс Танзан
PS/Mr Goodlad
Sir J Coles
Mr Ricketts, HKD Mr Bickham,
Special Adviser
Mr Cornish, News Department
JONATHAN DIMBLEBY: HONG KONG
1.
In your minute of 15 March you recorded that the Secretary of State had agreed in principle to give an on-the-record interview on Hong Kong to
Jonathan Dimbleby, and to allow him to film a policy meeting with officials. You asked for my advice on timing.
2.
I do not think that the timing of an
on-the-record interview with the Secretary of State is particularly sensitive. This could best be arranged to meet the Secretary of State's convenience. I assume that the interview would in any event focus on the larger questions rather than the minutiae, given that the interview will not be broadcast until after 1997. It might however be preferable to wait until after the die is cast in one way or another; that is to say until there is agreement on talks with the Chinese or (much more probable) in the absence of agreement we committed to the introduction and discussion of the Governor's proposals in LegCo.
3.
Where the timing of a filmed policy meeting with officials is concerned, these meetings are not frequent. We can rarely be certain that there will not be sensitive issues to be discussed: but if they are too sensitive I assume that it would be possible to handle them separately. I would however continue to advise against the filming of the occasional meetings in which the Governor takes part. On the last such occasion the Secretary of State decided that filming could have an inhibiting or distorting effect upon the discussions, thereby reducing the usefulness of the meeting. I think the same risks being the case in any such meeting with the Governor in the future.
CONFIDENTIAL
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