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Governor's question-and-answer session in LegCo
Following is the Governor, the Rt Hon Christopher Patten's question-and- answer session in the Legislative Council today (Thursday):
Mrs Selina Chow: Mr Governor, recently, we've had protests from Vietnamese migrants. This is a rather common phenomenon in recent days and yet your Policy Address is silent on this, and on the TV programme last evening you didn't say anything much on it either. And in the Progress Report it is admitted that you have not achieved your target, and yet in your Policy Address you haven't told us what exactly you plan to do. So, what sort of contingency plans do you have in the pipeline? In other words, if by 1997 we fail to repatriate all VBPs, what is going to happen, and will the UK take the remaining ones? I think that is more practical than trying to get passports for the three-odd million people in Hong Kong.
Governor: First of all, on the television programme which the Honourable lady stayed up to watch last night, I did have one question on the issue which the Honourable lady raises and I gave what I thought, and everybody else seemed to think, was an honest answer. Our policy on Vietnamese migrants is exactly the same as it was when the Honourable lady was a member of the Executive Council and we are attempting to implement that policy as effectively as possible. The Honourable lady may recall that we were having some success in repatriating Vietnamese migrants voluntarily; we've managed to move about 45,000 since 1989. In 1992 and 1993 Vietnamese migrants and of course there was the Orderly Repatriation were returning voluntarily Programme but they were returning voluntarily at about 1,000 a month. Unfortunately, a number of circumstances, including a vote in the US Congress, have dried up the flow of voluntary repatriation, so we are trying to move forward with the Orderly Repatriation Programme but we undoubtedly need to encourage voluntary repatriation as well. We will continue to do everything we can to get the Vietnamese migrants back to Vietnam, and as for what happens if we don't succeed, I'd prefer to concentrate on succeeding.
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The Honourable lady knows, I think, perfectly well, that it is hardly helpful to hold out wholly unrealistic prospects of what might happen to Vietnamese migrants if they haven't gone back by 1997. They're not going to find a home in the United Kingdom, they're not going to find a home in Australia, they're not going to find a home in the United States, and nobody should give them that impression. It isn't helpful to give them that impression because it encourages them not to volunteer.