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SUMMARY RECORD OF MEETING TO DISCUSS TRANSFER OF DOCUMENTS AND
FUNCTIONS FROM HKID TO THE BRITISH CONSULATE GENERAL
The meeting was held in Clive House from 11.00-12.30 on
29 November 1993. The meeting was attended by:
Mr Woodrow, HKD
(Chairman)
Mrs Barnes Jones, HKD
Mr Mulcahy, MVD
MKD 444/2
RECELE
- 3 DEC 1993
Mr Rooney, NTCD
1.
INDER
BISTRY
Action Tøkan
The purpose of the meeting was to firm up responses to questions put by Mr Francis Cheung, Director of Hong Kong Immigration Department in two letters written to the FCO in July and October this year about what documents will need to be handed over to the Consulate General (CG) and when.
2. The background is that NTCD/MVD/Consular Department have already established with HKID which documents will be needed by the CG Passport and Entry Clearance operations respectively. But HKID's filing methods pose a problem; documents on nationality, entry clearance, consular matters and other matters in which the FCO has no interest, are all filed in micro-film form in individual dossiers for named individuals. It would be impractical for HKID to start a new system at this stage or to break down the filing to date under the functions which fall respectively to MVD, NTCD and Consular Department.
3. The meeting reviewed a partial solution suggested by Mr Cheung. All present agreed that it fell well short of FCO needs and that it would demand a huge effect to implement from HKD. All present recognised the need to standardise the Hong Kong operation to bring it in line with best practice world-wide. But it was concluded that there was no option but to take on the Hong Kong system of lektrievers (the name of the system which stores and displays the microfilm). These would gradually become redundant as active information was transferred to the Consulate General data banks and the lektrievers dossiers could
gradually be discarded. In the meantime it was agreed that the lektrievers would need to be sited in a place convenient for all those who needed access to the information contained in them. Mr Rooney suggested, and Mr Mulcahy agreed that the passport operation should take on the lektrievers, allowing access to entry clearance officers and others as necessary. All present agreed that action would be needed on the following points:
Further work on how many lektrievers will be needed; some preliminary calculations have already been made.
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Mr Woodrow's reply to Mr Cheung will go over these and ask for advice).
Need to establish how many lektrievers can be obtained from HKID, and on what basis. Mr Woodrow's reply to Mr Cheung to make these points.
It would be helpful to be able to take hard copies from the information displayed on the lektrievers. Mr Woodrow to explore with Mr Cheung (may need to take advice from technical departments in the FCO in due course).
On other points raised by Mr Cheung the meeting agreed that Mr Woodrow's reply should tell HKID that:
(a) the FCO could not yet tell Mr Cheung when the Consulate General would be operational (ie staff in place and trained, building fitted out) but that for planning purposes we could assume that everything would be in place by the fourth quarter of 1996.
(b) we trusted that HKID would be able to process those applications for naturalisation and registration as BDTC accepted before April 1996 and finalise them by the end of 1996.
(c) the Consulate General would aim to accept applications for BN (0) passports from April 1997, but that as Mr Cheung noted in his letter, HKG and the British side would need to monitor the situation carefully on processing BN (0) and BDTC applications and both sides would need to work together to make sure that we met our responsibilities in the run-up to 1997.
(d) the Consulate General should be able to fall in with HKID's wish to see follow-up action on applications outstanding in relation to the British Nationality Scheme (BNS) taken by the CG as from January 1997 (with a marker once again that both sides will need to monitor likely numbers as 1997 draws nearer).
On (b) the meeting considered two main factors (i) will construction start on time and remain on schedule? (ii) Need for time to decide internally on the optimum hand-over schedule, taking into account resource implications and length of time needed in advance of 1 July 1997 to get a "class" operation up and running.
On (c) Mr Rooney noted the need to check with the Home Office when they will be withdrawing the team now overseeing the BNS.
4.
The meeting noted the need for liaison with the Home Office on eg transfer of records of applications under the British Nationality Scheme. Mrs Barnes Jones undertook to speak with Mr Kelly B4 Division, Home Office, who had recently visited Hong
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DS6?
Kong to talk about this and other matters. The meeting
concluded that we could not sign up to a definite timetable with HKID until this had been seen by RFD and PMD. But as long as we explained the caveat, we could agree in principle with the sort of arrangements envisaged by Mr Cheung.
5. Mr Rooney and Mr Mulcahy noted that there was no parallel to the hand-over operation which would take place in Hong Kong. Intensive preparations would be necessary. They advised that it would be crucial to put a liaison officer in HKID up to a year before the transfer. The ideal scenario would be to post the future Consul (DS5) to Hong Kong a year before the transfer. There could be no substitute for the insight which such a posting would give the DS officer charged with setting up the passport and entry clearance operations in Hong Kong. There would also need to be an officer/s at the London end working closely with HKID, the liaison officer in Hong Kong and the Management Officer at the British Trade Commission to make logistic preparations (such as ordering the requisite stationery).
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6. It was agreed that further detailed work needed to be done on personnel matters it was important to gauge as accurately as possible in this unparalleled operation what should be the composition of an advance team, when they should go and what their job descriptions should be. Mrs Barnes Jones volunteered HKD to produce a piece of paper setting out the areas were decisions were needed and commissioning job descriptions from MVD/NTCD where appropriate. She also undertook to liaise between the Departments present at the meeting and Mr Moss and the PMD task-force set up to make the necessary arrangements for Hong Kong staffing in the run up to 1997.
Deborah Barnes Jones
WH312 HKD
30 November, 1993
CC Mr Mulcahy, MVD
Mr Rooney,
NTCD
Mr Thomas, Consular Department
Mr Woodrow, HKD
Mr Moore, HKD (RMO for Hum command) Mr Moss, PMD
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