CO129-604-5 Immigration- control over entry from China 4-3-1948 - 6-1-1949 — Page 20

54064/48.

11

Colonial office,

The Church House,

Great Smith Street,

S. W. 1.

Der hac dongall

13 20

6th December, 1948.

Please refer to my letter of 12th October,1948,

with which I enclosed a copy of a Memorandum

prepared by our Legal Advisers about the alleged right of Chinese to enter Hong Kong.

I now enclose a copy of a letter from Scott of the Foreign office commenting on the Memorandum. You will note that they have modified their views as expressed in Scott's letter af 23rd October, 1947 (a copy of which was sent to you under cover of Mayle's letter of 5th November, 1947), and now find themselves in general agreement with the arguments and corclusions reached in our Memorandum. We are therefore now agreed that the Chinese have no right, prescriptive or otherwise, to enter or settle in Hong Kong

with regard to the Foreign Office point about the political considerations involved in restricting the entry of Chinese to Hong Kong, I am drawing their attention to the fact that control over the entry of Chinese arriving from all countries other than China has already been instituted (paragraph 2 of Hong Kong secret savingram No. 62 of the 6th August, 1948, and paragraph 3 of Hong Kong telegram No. 1010 of the 6th November, 1948, refer). I have also said

D. M. MacDOUGALL, ESQ., C.M.G.

that

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