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Governor: Let's follow through a likely course of events. Mr X goes to the British Consulate-General and says, "I'm in trouble, I'm a British citizen, I have a British passport, I want consular protection". The British Consul says, "Fine. I will take up your problem with the authorities, with the government". He goes to the government and somebody says to him, "You can't make formal representations on behalf of Mr X because we don't think that he is a solely British citizen, we think he has got dual nationality". The Consulate-General would presumably then say, "Where is your evidence? Show me your evidence". If the evidence that was shown seemed satisfactory to the Consul-General in the circumstances, he would still presumably wish to go on giving the person who had come to his door as much assistance as he conceivably could. If he disagreed with the authorities about the evidence of dual nationality then he would presumably argue about it and there would be a row.
A point I was seeking to make earlier is, if the sort of attitude expressed in that Xinhua statement, if the sort of attitude that one saw in the case of Mr James Pang, if that prevails in Hong Kong after 1997 there are going to be if you will excuse my demotic - a hell of a lot of rows on issues like this. And not just with the British Government and the British Consulate but with other consulates as well.
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Dr C.H. Leong: Mr President, I would like to change the question a little bit if I may and ask the Governor whether he could inform this Council what prompted the high- ranking British official to make that statement two days ago that caused all this problem?
Governor: Well, I think it is fair to say - and this is not a criticism of the media and it is not a criticism of legislators - these issues are invested with huge sensitivity. I wish they weren't. The sensitivity with which they are invested is itself in a sense an expression of concern about civil liberties and related matters in the future. In those circumstances an attempt, honestly, to answer what would be the consequences if someone held dual nationality turned into a misunderstanding that what was being said was that nobody who had got a passport under the BNS Scheme could get consular protection. That is not, as I hope perhaps I have made heavy weather with the point, repeating it over and over again but that is not the case.
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But again to repeat myself. From Patagonia to Papua, New Guinea, if you are a dual national then the help you can get from a British Consulate or a French Consulate or a German Consulate or any Consulate is limited because of the international conventions and because of the international law. I think that it is understandable why the issue came up. The Chief Secretary and I were extremely keen to give as much and as clear reassurance as soon as possible, as comprehensively as possible, that is why we asked the Foreign Office to put out a statement yesterday and that is why that statement having been made, I wished to come to this Council as soon as possible to go through all the arguments again myself.