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Prime Minister: We have tried to deal fairly with Hong Kong over the years. But the underlying premise of your question seemed to me to be that one is coming to the end of a period in which Britain will have any interest in Hong Kong. That emphatically is not the case. The Governor has been here representing, as well as I think anyone could have done, the interests of Hong Kong over recent years. Going back even earlier, the negotiation of the Joint Declaration was essential, and the determination of Basic Law was essential in the interests of Hong Kong, essential that the rule of law continues. And I have been here to try and assist with some of the problems that Hong Kong has.
So I believe yes, we have dealt fairly and honestly and openly with Hong Kong, and we will continue to do so, both in the short term and the long term.
Question: Specifically on the passports?
Governor: You've had your question.
Prime Minister: Yes, that is the answer.
Question (Bruce Gillie, Far East Economic Review): You announced with a great flourish the visa-free access decision and yet we all know that that can be revoked within a matter of days if someone, for example, the question raised by my British colleague about abuses comes up. So shouldn't you have offered some greater guarantee that that visa-free travel requirement can somehow be maintained? What is to stop the British Government from revoking it the moment some abuse is discovered?
Prime Minister: Well I don't see why we would be likely to do that. I didn't have to offer visa-free access now. I did so because I think it is in the interests of Hong Kong that we do so and I think it is in the interests of the United Kingdom that we do so for a raft of reasons as well. So I don't anticipate a short term reversal of this.
We have visa-free access for other countries. It would be equally true of you to say to me we could reverse visa-free access for all those other countries but we have had visa-free access for them for years, it hasn't been reversed. This is not an offer made in bad faith. This is an offer made in good faith and it is an offer that is going to be maintained. All visa-free access around the world is upon that basis and that is the basis upon which I have announced it today.
There is no need and no justification for people to poke around in the undergrowth of this statement to see if there is some trick underlying it. There is no trick.