XN000022-1997-04-16 — Page 4

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It seemed to us to be a sensible way of giving the community the certainty it requires without running into all the problems which will undoubtedly be associated with any attempt to legislate in the provisional legislature on these matters before 30 June.

Now, we have made it clear again and again that even though it would be perhaps ideal if we could legislate today, that there is no administrative or legal necessity for doing so. Our clear legal advice, the advice which we have from the Immigration Department, is that we don't absolutely need to legislate until July, that it is perfectly possible for the Immigration Department to do all that they need to do before then, but that Hong Kong would need legislation in place in the early weeks of the SAR Government.

We have equally clear legal and administrative advice that if the provisional legislature tries to do this job before 30 June, it is inevitably going to raise legal question-marks about our immigration policy and our right of abode after 1 July.

Now you all know that this is an area in which there are countless legal challenges in court. It would be grossly irresponsible of us to do anything which could magnify, which could increase the number of those challenges after 1 July. I am not making that up, that is the legal advice that we have. So why is it, why is it that Chinese officials and the SAR Government-in-waiting can't accept our practical proposal for a White Bill on the understanding that the provisional legislature doesn't try to deal with it before 1 July?

The issue, you know, as far as some people are concerned, has nothing to do with right of abode but everything to do with their attempts to give the provisional legislature some legitimacy or credibility, the legitimacy and credibility which it doesn't have today and which it won't have before 30 June, whatever the situation is after that.

So once again I appeal to Chinese officials and to the SAR Government-in- waiting to react positively to our proposal for a White Bill, with the undertaking that the provisional legislature won't attempt to deal with it. That is a way in which everybody can get what they should want, which is the opportunity for the community to look carefully at what is proposed and for the community to be certain about right of abode and immigration policy for the future.

Now I couldn't have set it out in more detail or, I hope, more clearly than that. That is our position. Our position is not going to change. We offer a White Bill provided we get that undertaking, but we are not going to do any more than that.