TNAG-0340-FCO40-376-Aid-to-Hong-Kong-from-UK-1972 — Page 5

Reference.

Mr Mathieson

AID TO EDUCATION IN HONG KONG

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Copies to: Mr J K Wright

Mr Thornton

Mr Jones

Mr Thom

r K N Wilford (FCO)

I should like to draw your attention to the recent agreement to make available £500,000 for books and equipment for the Hong Kong Polytechnic. This was preceded last year by a gift of £400,000 for equipment for certain technical institutes which either are being or may be built in Hong Kong. These have been the subject of Ministerial decisions. Nevertheless they raise certain problems about aid to Hong Kong on which I think clarification is necessary.

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I heard about the gift for the library from Mr Wright, of the EPS. If those of us who are concerned with either books or technical education (Education Division, the Education Advisers or TETOC) had been consulted (as you will gather from the preceding minutes, including that from Mr Thornton) we should have commented that it would no doubt be perfectly possible to spend this money usefully in providing such a library; but that the magnitude of the gift is out of all proportion to the total amount of money which is normally available in the aid programme for spending on books. Nor, of course, would it be possible to justify the gift on grounds of need.

3. On looking into the matter we learned more of the previous gift of £400,000 to the technical institutes, on which Education Division had been consulted in the earlier stages and on which Mr Gailer had been asked to advise on the details after the gift had been made. The history of this gift is somewhat strange, in that no agreement had been reached at that time that the second, third and fourth institutes would actually be built; and the Governor, when consulted after the event, pointed this out and asked whether the funds could not be used more generally for equipment for technical education. £100,000 out of the total of £400,000 has now been allocated to the original purpose; it appears that the possibility of re-allocation of some, at least, of the remainder has recently been under consideration. A note on the history of this gift is opposite on the file.

4. We obviously need to establish contact with Hong Kong and Indian Ocean Department to discuss what is to be done about the expenditure of these funds. Their letter of 1 December last to Hong Kong provides a basis for such discussion. I think that Mr Jones should bring them into contact with Dr Pickard and TETOC as soon as Hong Kong has replied to the letter in question.

5. The more general problems relate to our policy as regards aid to Hong Kong and what we say about it. The usual line which we in Education Division follow (and have always understood to be general office policy) is that Hong Kong is not an aid recipient. There is, for example, a link between Hong Kong and the Inner London Education Authority which might, in theory, be supported by aid but which we have not considered eligible for it. We have been rather cautious about sending Advisers to Hong Kong because they might find themselves in the embarrassing necessity of having to decline requests for aid. We have taken this line repeatedly in TETOC, which has its own links with the Hong Kong Polytechnic, and finds our attitude difficult to understand. It looks as though, while this line may be generally right, it is always liable to the serious qualification that quite large handouts may be given to Hong Kong for political reasons.

CODE 18-77

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