XN000022-1996-05-11 — Page 5

Daily Information Bulletin 新聞公報 All

We do, obviously, need to consider some of the lessons from what has happened at Whitehead, and we will be reporting during the coming week to the Legislative Council - I think to their Security Panel - about some of the measures that we intend to take to try to enhance security in the camps.

But I think that I speak for the whole community in saying that this is not behaviour which can be tolerated and we will take every possible measure to deal with it firmly. I think there are still 32 Vietnamese migrants who are missing, and we will obviously step up the hunt for those so that they can be returned to secure conditions as rapidly as possible.

Second and last, can I just say a word or two about the war-widows bill. You will all know the efforts that we have put in to persuading the British Government and the British Parliament to accept this legislative commitment. It is something which Jack Edwards has bravely fought for for years, and I was delighted when the Prime Minister was here and able to give his commitment that the bill would go forward, and I was delighted as well when the Labour Party, most recently in the person of Robin Cook, gave assurances that they would support it.

Now the House of Commons, like other legislative assemblies around the world, sometimes makes mistakes and I think that what happened yesterday was, frankly, a mistake rather than something that was achieved by deliberate design. What we have got to work to do now is to get the bill back on the rails so that it can be passed into law as soon as possible. But I don't want anybody to be under any doubt the bill will become law in due course. What I want to do is to make the 'in due course' as soon as we possibly can. It is a bill which has the support of the Conservative Party, it is a bill which has the support of the Labour Party, it is a bill which has the support of the Liberal Democrats and, I think, others in the House of Commons. It will go through. But I am sorry that this slip-up yesterday has delayed things a bit.

End

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