4
CONFIDENTIAL
a period of some months.
This means that the
appointments to both Councils from 1 January, 1972, should
be temporary only and we think they should be announced
as such. The simplest solution would be to extend
the appointments of the present Members for a suitable
period (3/6 months) but there may be some difficulty
in this (for example you told us last year that
Y K Kan wished to retire quite soon). We hope that
the reasons for such arrangements would be readily
understood locally.
this end.
4.
We foresee no difficulties at
Whatever we do, MacLehose will have to rely
heavily on your advice for the initial arrangements.
I should be grateful therefore if you could let us
have your detailed recommendations on the composition
of both Councils for the first few months of
MacLehose's Governorship.
5.
Apart from that, we think it would be helpful
to MacLehose to discuss with us next June the
possibility of broadening the basis of representation.
I know that when we exchanged letters on this last
year you doubted whether any great departure from
previous practice was feasible. We have however
been looking again at some of the considerations
involved and we would like to take advantage of your
presence here next June to clear our minds.
6. With this in view we have attempted to sort out
our thoughts and the stage we have reached can be
summarized as follows
(a) Payment of Unofficial Members
As you yourse
yourselye have pointed out, if Unofficial
Members were paid, cynical people would tend to doubt
whether they were disinterested.
I must confess
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