TNAG-0138-FCO40-174-Conduct-of-Hong-Kong-commercial-relations-1969 — Page 148

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Mr. Carter

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H.K. Commercine Relatium Tile.

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12

Hong Kong

I had a word on the telephone today with Mr. W. Hughes, Board

of Trade, who has now returned from his Far Eastern trip which

included a visit to Hong Kong. He said he had found his visit to

Hong Kong very helpful and that he thought that the Hong Kong

Administration, after initial wariness towards him, had enjoyed the

opportunity of arguing their point of view with him. He saw the Governor, the Colonial Secretary, Sir John Cowperthwaite and

Mr. Sorby, as well as supporting officials. I gathered from him

that the main burden of his discussions revolved around the Board

of Trade's "claim" to control Hong Kong's commercial negotiations with third countries, and I had the impression (though it would not be fair to Mr. Hughes to quote this) that, though he argued the

orthodox Board of Trade view, he was in fact impressed by the force

of arguments put to him by Hong Kong that H. M. G. were incapable of negotiating on behalf of Hong Kong and by attempting to insert themselves into Hong Kong's negotiations, in practice were prejudicing both their own interests and those of Hong Kong. The Governor told

him that he wished to raise this as a constitutional and political issue with the Office during his forthcoming leave in this country and Mr. Hughes anticipated that we would have to put the issue to

Ministers.

2. He told me he was less impressed with Hong Kong's argument

against the U.K. cotton tariff and told them so.

3. I told him that the Governor was not proposing to come to the

Office for discussions until the second half of November. Mr. Hughes

said that this involved a question of timing which arose out of the

current exchange of telegrams about the American attempt to restrict

imports of non-cotton textiles from Far Eastern countries including

Hong Kong. He himself thought that the suggestion of the Ambassador in Washington that the time was ripe for a Prime Ministerial message to the President was probably rushing matters (he had not seen the similar view expressed by Sir Eugene Melville in a telegram today from Geneva) but he thought that it might well be necessary for such

a message to be sent to the President about the time the Japanese Prime Minister was proposing to visit Washington in the first half of

CONFIDENTIAL

November.