later date the Governor said that although he had proposed that two of the members of the Legislative Council should come from the Urban Council, he was prepared to increase that number to 3. Paskin did not mention this point to you in his previous letter as we thought that on the time table we then had in view Grantham himself would follow up these points on his return to Hong Kong. The curtailment of his leave however, makes it desirable to mention them now. The point has been further discussed with him in the light of your letter, and we are agreed that there should be an increase of one in the number of unofficial members, and the Secretary of State would on the whole prefer that this additional member were 'elected' rather than 'nominated'. Whether this should be secured by way of indirect election by the Social Welfare Associations, or by the 'election' of an additional member from the Urban District Council is à point on which we should await final recommendations in due course. It would appear, however, that if an additional unofficial member is
'elected' and not nominated, it will not be sufficient for the Governor to have a casting vote only as suggested in the second paragraph of your letter.. Indeed, it might be desirable to increase the number of official members to five in order to ensure that a sufficient number of votes could be relied upon to support the Goverment on "politico-international" issues.
5. Turning to the third, fourth and fifth paragraphs of your letter, we gather from Granthem that he sent you a copy of the letter which Mr. Cook sent to him on the 26th July. That letter made it clear that the Secretary of State was anxious to ensure that all persons who wold have been able to vote under the 1949 proposals would still be able to do so under the new proposals, since if this were arranged it would afford him a reasonable reply
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