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(c) to consult with his ministerial colleagues,
either without a recommendation, or recommending
that the law be changed.
If Ministers decide that the law must be changed, we should
inform the Governor within five weeks of receiving his prelimi-
nary conclusions (or four weeks if we go back to him with
further comments), so that Executive Council can be informed
before an Order is presented to the Privy Council. The
Executive Council would then have three weeks for consideration.
This makes the timetable eight weeks in all. An Order in
Council would then be made (the legal aspects of a draft Order
having been cleared in advance with Hong Kong). If the
Executive Council decision is known before the end of their
three week period, we should in normal circumstances be able
to make the Order in Council within the overall eight week
period or very shortly thereafter. If a delay of more than a
week or two is expected we could, less satisfactorily, announce
publicly our intention to change the law.
4.
There is one point in this procedure which has been
queried by Sir Hugh Norman-Walker. When the Governor warns
the Secretary of State of his likely decision to let the law
take its course we would hope that it would still be open to
us to send comments which might conceivably help him to review
his decision.
5. Sir Hugh Norman-Walker thinks that a running argument
about the details of a case is undesirable and he hopes the
/Secretary
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