XN000022-1996-06-28 — Page 5

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Governor: Can I first of all ask whether there are any other questions on disability?

Question: Mr Patten, will there be any special arrangements during the handover ceremony next year for disabled people ...?

Governor: I'm sure that we should make sure that the handover ceremony makes. proper allowance for people with disability so that they too can take part in the ceremony. It will involve considering issues like access for wheel chairs and related matters. But it's obviously important that they should be able to share in that particular aspect of Hong Kong's life just as they share in every other aspect of Hong Kong's life. Okay. Now your questions were first of all... Andrew Wong.

I still haven't received a communication from Andrew Wong, but it may have come to the Government Secretariat. The situation as I've said on several other occasions, not least here, is absolutely straight forward. I as Governor, though no longer is President of the Legislative Council, decide when the session of the Legislative Council should start with my Policy Address and we've given a date again for this October. It's then for the President of the Legislative Council and for the Legislative Council themselves to decide on the dates of their sittings and they tell me what the dates of their sittings are and I take note of it. But that's a decision which they have to arrive at and I'm sure that they wouldn't want to pass over their proper responsibilities to the executive and to the Governor.

On the first point, we had long discussions about this back in 1992, 1993 and 1994. I can remember in particular answering questions about this large and very ancient red herring in January 1994 when I gave evidence to the Foreign Affairs Select Committee. Those who worked on the proposals which we put in my first speech to the Legislative Council in the autumn of 1992 included several people who had discussed, taken part in the drafting of those letters and exchanges. Those letters and exchanges were read in detail by me before I had any meetings with Director Lu Ping. And the fact of the matter is that the issue is pretty irrelevant anyway because in the first place the only agreement that was reached in 1990 was one over the number of directly elected seats in the Legislative Council where the figure went up from 18 to 20. There was no other agreement reached. It's sometimes suggested that there was an agreement over the election committee, but since Chinese officials were still talking about different arrangements for the election committee in 1995, it's very difficult to see how that can be the case. so I hope that this ancient red herring which's once again swum round Victoria Island will now be netted and thrown in the dustbin.

Now you may want to ask questions to those who'd taken part in this afternoon's summit. But thank you very much indeed for coming this afternoon.

End