TNAG-0229-FCO40-265-Long-term-study-of-future-of-Hong-Kong-1970 — Page 25

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SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FOREIGN AND COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS

Meeting of Committee on Hong Kong, 8 May 1970 K(69) 1 and K(70) 1

Attendance

All members of your Committee are expected to be present, with the exception of the President of the Board of Trade who will be away on official business. You agreed that he should be represented by his Minister of State,

Mr. Goronwy Roberts.

Procedure

2.

You may wish to open discussion of K(70) 1 by asking your colleagues whether they are content to endorse the four general conclusions outlined in paragraph 6 of K(70) 1. You may have additional points to make on the Conclusions (b) - (a) in the light of your recent visit to the Colony. If your colleagues are generally content with this approach, you might like to seek their specific approval to the review proposed in paragraph 7 and of the subsidiary studies advocated in K(69) 1 (see paragraph 6 below).

Points of detail

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3. The Defence Secretary and the Minister of State, Board of Trade, may well wish to comment on two matters on which K(69) 1, because of the lapse of time since it was prepared, may be somewhat out of date the forces to be maintained in the Colony, and their costs, and our trade relations with Hong Kong, and with

China.

4. Paragraph 18 of K(69) 1 postulates a post-1971 deployment in the Colony of 7 major army units, 2 frigates, 5 coastal minesweepers and one small tanker, and 6 Whirlwind helicopters. The Defence Secretary may wish to say whether this remains his estimate of the forces required, and the Chief Secretary may have some comment to make onthe costs, given in paragraph 19 (which are now, no doubt, understated in that they were prepared before the recent introduction of the military salary). There is currently, also, pressure from Nepal for a significant increase to be made in Gurkha pay, and this will obviously affect

the cost of the Gurkha units in Hong Kong.

5.

On trade with Hong Kong and China, the Committee may wish to satisfy

As to trade with itself that we are doing all we can to help Hong Kong trade. China, there has been some improvement during the last year, and the Ministerial Committee on Strategic Exports approved on 25 March a (non-public) liberalisa- tion of our policy on the export of civil aircraft to China. An increase, in terms both of quantity and of particular items, in China's trade with the

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