TNAG-0385-FCO40-431-Trade-relations-between-Hong-Kong-and-the-EEC-1974 — Page 119

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PARLIAMENTARY QUESTION

for WRITTEN | answer on. 9 November 1973

Không ương

Hong

The draft reply should reach the Parliamentary Office through your Under-Secretary_by

17W

$11am Today 9/11

Mr Peter Hordern (Horsham): To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, in view of the United Kingdom's obligation to align with the EEC's Generalised System of Preferences on 1st January 1974, what action he is taking to remedy the exclusión from the Generalised System of Preferences of Hong Kong's textile and footwear exports.

Mr. Anthoms Pryce

At a meeting of the Council of Ministers of the EEC on

6 November, my Kt hon Friend, the Chancellor of the

Duchy of Lancaster, made a strong statement on the

position of Hong Kong. He said that during the

enlargement negotiations in 1971 the Community had

agreed to admit Hong Kong to its Generalised System

of Preferences, subject to the exclusion of her

textiles and footwear exports. Our Chief Negotiator

but at the time had agreed to this arrangement he had

made it clear to the Community that it would be the

United Kingdom's continuing concern to avoid

discrimination against Hong Kong. The arrangements

agreed by our partners in 1971 may have seemed to them

not ungenerous. But an important consideration now was

that since 1971 the situation had changed to the

detriment of Hong Kong and that the Philippines,

Thailand and Yugoslavia, all of them serious

competitors of Hong Kong, had become beneficiaries

under the Community's scheme in respect of cotton

We had examined this matter carefully and

textiles.

had concluded that in present circumstances it was no

longer acceptable for discrimination to apply against

Hong Kong.

/As this aspect