TNAG-0012-FCO40-48-Kowloon-disturbances-1967 — Page 97

QUESTION:

When you said American ships were going

in, do you mean by that American soldiers are s till having

leave in Hong Kong?

SIR DAVID TRENCH: Yes. They have never been attacked

or made targets at all.

QUESTION: Has there ever been a pause there or all

the way through they have been coming in?

QUESTION:

SIR DAVID TRENCH: They have been coming through.

Could you tell us, Sir, about participation

Very restricted elected representatives in

in Government?

public affairs. Is the thing in transition?

SIR DAVID TRENCH: I would like to get a better system

of local authorities going. Of course I would. I have said so

very openly and we have various ideas on this.

Whether Hong

Kong would accept this is another thing. Hong Kong does not

want ballot boxes and elections. They do not understand it.

They think it is dangerous. The potential electorate for the

urban councils is somewhere round about 400,000 of which

25,000 have registered as electors.

thing is foreign to the Chinese thought which is a pity.

I would like to get a better system of locàl

12,000 voted. The whole

authorities, more regulated, just as I would like to get a

better system, to start putting a cautious toe into the field

of social security. This is a completely foreign concept again

to

get Hong Kong to understand this form of insurance.

ordinary Chinese will not insure anyway.

The

QUESTION: You were quoted, I think, as saying we

were looking to discuss the question of labour legislation.

Has anything emerged on that? What is likely to come out?

SIR DAVID TRENCH: We have about thirty pieces of

legislation on the stocks in the Labour Department.

The normal

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