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Colonial office,

Sanctuary Buildings,

Great Smith Street,

8.W.1.

ក.

P

AL AND CONFIDENTIAL

15 August, 1949.

Dear Hardy,

Your personal and confidential letter to Blackburno, dated 23rd July, would have been answered earlier, and by Blackburne himself, had it not been necessary first to refer to papers which were caught up with another problem concerning Hong Kong broadcasting and temporarily rendered inacessible in consequence.

Now Blackburne is away for a short holiday.

I have spoken to

several of the people most concerned in the B.B.C. Their reaction to your suggestions seems to be generally sympathetic. They certainly welcome in principle the suggestion that you might fit their two vacancies for Chinese Programme Assistants from your own staff. They are not quite so enthusiastic about seconding two senior men to you "in exchange".

I think I see their point there. You are, as it were, asking for a queen and bishop in exchange for a couple of knights, if not pawns, and, while the B.B.C. has no desire to be pernickety about the relative status of staff seconded in each direction, the more senior staff are liable to be more difficult to find, or, once found, to release. If, therefore, the arrangement were to be regarded as a numerically balanced exchange, the B.B.C. might find it difficult to fulfil its part of the bargain.

To this I might add that it is not by

D. KEITH HARDY, ESQ.

/any

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