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I said yesterday in a speech, that as far as I was concerned this was one of the main tasks for my last weeks and months as Governor. I would find it - and I will say this very openly to the Council - I would find it very difficult to depart on 30 June - that is not to suggest that I am not going to depart on 30 June I would find it extremely difficult to depart on 30 June leaving behind some thousands of people who had right of abode in Hong Kong but no nationality here, a sort of nationality in Britain but no right of abode there. That may not, literally, be statelessness but it looks awfully like statelessness to those who are in that position. I think it would be an exceptionally unfortunate way for Britain to bring the curtain down in this last of its great colonial dependencies.
Mr Howard Young: With your knowledge of parliamentary experience in London, if the Election is held as late as, say, middle of May, does it look likely that such a Bill could physically pass through Parliament, bearing in mind the Easter recess and all of that?
Governor: I think, to be honest, whenever the Election came, a commitment by the government of the day, either not to oppose Private Members' legislation or to put forward legislation itself, would pretty well deal with the question of the ethnic minorities even if that legislation had not completed all its stages before 30 June. I think they would be content to know that they were going to get a passport. In an ideal world that would all be accomplished before the middle of the summer but I think, to be realistic, those who have campaigned so eloquently and so decently for a fair deal for the ethnic minorities would be pretty satisfied by a pledge to legislate even if it could not be guaranteed that that legislation would be in place before the change of sovereignty.
Mr Sin Chung-kai (in Chinese): I would like to go back to the question on human rights. Assuming that the Preparatory Committee is going to go along with the views of the Legal Sub-group to repeal the Societies Ordinance and Public Ordinance, do you think such a move is in breach of the Joint Declaration? If that is the case, what can the Hong Kong and British Governments do?
Governor: Well, what is it in breach of if this is done? First of all, it seems to me that what is proposed is in breach of all sense. As I understand it, what has been proposed is that these Ordinances should be struck-down, and the implication is that the old out of date colonial Ordinances should be put in their place. But if you repeal these Ordinances you do not automatically put another law in their place, unless, that is, that the NPC says that it is now going to legislate for these matters in Hong Kong as well. If you just strike the legislation down you are left with a legal vacuum. So what would the Public Order legislation in Hong Kong be on the 1st of July or the 2nd of July? The proposal makes no sort of legal sense.