21/4
LF Standen 194
+
Mr. Y.K. Pam's not correct about
w/251)
a HK Register bringing leer to HK. The cost To the HK Your (and HMG through consuler services) would for our weigh
Department of Trade & Industry
Shipping Division Sunley louse
90/93 High Holborn
London C1V 6LF
Mukuve
D
odfellow
interesting
•TY
A
RECEIVED IN REGISTRY No. 511
13 March 1974
20 MAR 1974
HKK 21/3
HONG KONG REGISTER OF SHIPPING
I assume there was someone from the Department of irade & Industry at the recent Institute of Marine Engineers .nnual Linner to hear ir Y n rao speak and you very probably managed to get a full text of his speech. But just in case my assumption is wrong I enclose for the record the text of his speech as published today in the South China Morning rost.
2.
Since 1 am now (I think) somewhat behind the game on the discussions over the Shipping hegister (the last I have seen is the Governor's telegram 230 of 19 l'ebruary), and since I am also not sure how far the change of Government may affect G's attitude on it I have not attempted to raise the matter with Alan Fletcher or anyone else to get their reaction to Y K Pao's remarks. His comments about the Register begged a whole sheaf of questions and suggested that either he had not hoisted in what all the discussions over the past several months have been about (and I cannot believe this) or he is deliberately choosing to ignore them in the interests of special pleading (which is more likely). It will be interesting to see whether his remarks provoke any reaction from the rest of the shipping community and, if so, what; I will let you know if anything does appear.
3. The other interesting passage in his speech is the reference to the budget where he has nicely combined the carrot and stick by suggesting that if the Hong Kong Government could achieve a Jhipping Register they might get a significant contribution to revenue (although this ignores the fact that the present indications leave doubt of how big that might be) while, at the same time, warning the Goverment off from attempting to tax the song song ship charterers - of whom Y A lao is by far the biggest - for their off shore
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