CO129-593-1 Future policy- unofficial views 18-6-1946 - 28-12-1946 — Page 37

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political consciousness.

Finally, dominating all proposals

for social reform, there looms the problem of free access to Hong Kong from China based on treaty rights. If, in Hong Kong there are good wages, good houses and the benefits of social services, will not the Colony be swamped by millions of half starved immigrants?

!

These are formidable difficulties and only an appreciation in London of the world significance of Hong Kong can generate the will and the power tổ overcome them. What then, should London do? The first step is to appoint a Governor of drive and imagination who is firmly convinced of the importance of a new policy. He should be a man of wide interests and of informal manner. The human sympathy and absence of pomposity which characterised Admiral Sir Cecil Harcourt, the head of the British Military Administration, gre tly endeared him to the Chinese. The new Governor should be accompanied by a Political Adviser, a man of similar outlook and an expert in Labour problems and in social reform, whouìñoald also be charged with the duty of maintaining the closest liaison with the Ambassador in Nanking.

?

The Governor and his Political Adviser should be instructed to draft a Five or Ten Year Plan for the social and economic development of the Colony which should be considered by the Foreign and Bolonial Offices before submission to the Cabinet. The plan would sugg st possible solutions for the immigration difficulty, posibly by limiting immigration or by confining the benefits of social legislation to residents of Hong Kong of, perhaps, ten years standing. Negotiations with China would clearly be involved. Secondly the proposals would deal with the financial aspects of the plan. The potential revenue of the Colony has hitherto scarcely been tppped. There is practically no income tax and if the citizens bore even a fair proportion of the burdens of the British taxpayer, large scale social reforms could be undertaken from local resources. But in the sphere of education and public relations some Imperial assistance may, for