TNAG-0513-FCO40-578-Development-of-Kai-Tak-airport-in-Hong-Kong-1974 — Page 15

CONFIDENTIAL

spread over a period suitable to the Hong Kong Government.

It was also thought that in the event of HMG deciding against

offering a route Copenhagen-Hong Kong to SAS there might be

advantage in making available to Hong Kong the ATCRS from aid

funds as a sweetener. The offer of a route to SAS has,

however, been made and although the Scandinavians have

accepted the route offered as "commercially viable" they

consider it "commercially unattractive". The refusal of the

Scandinavians even to consider the question of an aviation

quid pro quo has entailed indefinite adjournment of the talks.

Delays on a decision on the ATCRS, therefore, appear no longer

justified in this connection.

These

4. There are political grounds for providing an ATCRS.

are principally because it would show interest by HMG in

helping development, to a small degree, of Hong Kong's airport

at Kai Tak. Whilst HMG of course, controls air traffic rights

into Kai Tak, the latter has been built, expanded and

maintained at Hong Kong Government expense (apart from an

interest-free loan of £3 million made by HMG in 1956 for the

extension of the runway). Other requests by the Hong Kong

Government for aid for the airport have never got off the

ground largely because Hong Kong has never fitted into our

criteria for aid owing to the buoyancy of her economy and the

strength of her own resources.

5. Political grounds for providing aid for the airport are no different now from those thought insufficient in the past.

It

is unlikely in the present economic climate in this country and

in the aftermath of the Hong Kong Government's decision on the

/underground

A

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CONFIDENΤΑΙ

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