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(HKK 10/9)
ARAMURAL & CONFIDENTIAL
Дерб
1 October, 1970.
याब
You will be receiving by the bag which brings this letter another letter that I have sent to you on the subject of the defence contribution. That letter was agreed in draft with the other Ministries concerned here; and although it represents a considerable toning down of an earlier draft I nevertheless thought I should send you this separate and personal explanation of the circumstances in which that letter was written.
2. As you can readily understand, we are under strong pressure from the other Ministries concerned to persuade you to increase your offer of £8 million. There are some who believe that Hong Kong should boar the full cost of the "forces for internal security and related purposes" or at any rate that there should be a "progressive increase of the proportion of the expenditure borne by the Colony" (paragraph 4 of the letter). We are resisting this pressure and have made it clear to those Ministries that in our view you are right in your judgment that £8 million is the maximum that you could hope to securo; and that you will have difficulty in prounding your Executive Council to agree even to that
3. We do feel, however, that there is substance in the viow that has been put to us that over the period of a five year agreement, the real value of the contribution would substantially diminish unless there was provision for some form of annual adjustment to cover pay and price increases. This has undoubtedly proved to be the case with the current agreement. We very muuh hope, therefore, that you will give serious consideration to the suggestion that such a provision should be included in the new agreement.
4.
The two matters raised in paragraph 3 of the other lettor were merely points of clarification on whichI have no doubt that you will return affirmative roplies.
5.
In short, the primary purpose of this letter is to let you know that we are doing our best to get your assessment accepted.
(K.M. Wilford)
His Excellency
Sir David Trench, GCMG, MC,
Government House,
HONG KONG.
PERSONAL & CONFIDENTIAL
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