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SECRET
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government organization, quite seriously risk a Colony-wide take-over by the Urban Council.
7 The system I would, on first thoughts, like to see instituted therefore would be based on the enactment of an enabling Ordinance permitting other local authorities to be set up in the New Territories and containing provision to enable their constitutions and powers to be regulated by Warrant; this system to be applied to Tsuen Wan in the fairly near future (say within 3 years) and quite possibly nowhere else for some time to come. Whether the Urban Council would be re-established under this Ordinance or continue under its own legislation, amended to fall into line as much as possible is, of course, one of the many matters which would have to be sorted out.
8 If I may sum up so far, I feel we ought now to give some serious consideration to local government policy again because:-
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(a)
(b)
having regard to the existence of the Urban Council in the older urban areas, the New Territories new towns as they grow can scarcely be left to continue indefinitely under the District Officer system alone and, in the case of Tsuen Wan,
a decision on its future administration ought to be taken within two or three years;
the Urban Council must be allowed to evolve in some way, to give an outlet for the demands of the elected members and those who support their pretensions; but it is risky always to manoeuvre merely in response to pressure and it would be preferable to construct a general framework which would automatically limit the ambitious before considering how far we can safely go in broadening the Council's functions and cautiously modernizing its constitution;
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