CONFIDENTIAL
11. As you know, the DTI were eventually able to work out a way of handling the transition from quotas to tariffs without seriously disturbing the market to the detriment of domestic and overseas supplies.
5.
It is also relevant to note that in reply to a question in the Legislative Council on 7 April Mr Cater, the Director of Commerce and Industry, stated "The British Government had indicated that it understood the problems of Hong Kong's exporters and was looking into the matter urgently and sympathetically. An early reply had been promised to remove this uncertainty".
6. With the agreement of the Treasury and, of course, of the MOD, we are seeking £8.5 million a year from Hong Kong over a period of 5 years as a reasonable contribution towards the costs of maintaining HM armed forces in the Colony. I under stand (from Mr P Y Tang, an Unofficial Member of the Hong Kong Executive Council and also one of the leading textile undustrialists in the Colony, who called on Mr Royle recently) that revenue from the tariff on imports from Hong Kong will amount to some $64 million a year (about £4.5 million). Assuming that that figure is somewhere near the mark it would seem that for the sake of something rather more than £1 million (the proceeds of the duty on goods from Hong Kong for the first quarter of 1972) we shall be making it much more difficult for ourselves to obtain the much larger defence contribution (£42.5 million) which we are seeking to say nothing of the effect on our general relations with Hong Kong.
7. I very much hope you will agree that these considerations be brought to the notice of Ministers in the FCO. I feel myself that the point is sufficiently important to justify a letter from the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary to the Chancellor of the Exchequer.
26 April 1971
CC
Mr Wilford
Mr Byatt SAD
CONFIDENTIAL
E O Laird
Hong Kong Department
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.