CO537-6046 — Page 90

54145/4/50.

The Church Housé,

Great Smith Street,

London, S.W.1.

15th August, 1950.

ང་ལས་

"perm

Thank you for your letter about the Constitution. In order to avoid further delay I have made the addition which you have suggested in the letter to Nicoll which is now going off. Your addition appears as a new paragraph 3.

But I cannot help feeling that the programme outlined in that paragraph is a little too rapid. In the first place, it will surely look a little odd if, within the space of a fortnight, the unofficials are able to table MÁLALİLERİN Vroposals on the lines of those which you

brought home, especially since they will involve a certain amount of elaboration as regards the development of the Üzban Council.

Quite apart from this, there is, as I think you know, a feeling here that, the situation in the Far East being what it is, we ought not to be in too great a hurry about producing new proposals for the Secretary of State's consideration, This would be an additional reason for working to a considerably longer interval between the publication of the despatches and the tabling of a motion in Legislative Council.

If we are right in our feeling that we ought to be feeling our way cautiously before reaching the stage of being committed to constitutioral "advance" in Hong Kong, it would clearly be better for the brake to be applied in the earlier stages than in the later stages when either the Hong Kong Government or the Secretary of State

Sir A. Grantham, K.C.K.G.

/might

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