TNAG-0571-FCO40-704-Planning-paper-on-Hong-Kong-1976 — Page 141

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satisfy critics unfamiliar with the "Chinese dimension" or unable to accept the absence of normal progress towards democratic institutions. Moreover if too much were claimed for these institutional changes we would risk misleading the Chinese into reading too much into them. But if carefully handled these institutional changes will be beneficial to social cohesion in Hong Kong. It is furthermore important that changes in the Legislative Council should not be of a character to prejudice the effectiveness of the Councils as instruments for implementing the Government's social and development programmes. This argues in favour of appointing persons, from whatever background or income group, capable of taking a broad and progressive view of the colony's requirements, as well as of ensuring that the interests of workers as well as of employers are protected. There may be opposition in Hong Kong to changes even of this nature and the process will need to be evolutionary rather than revolutionary in character.

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There is considerable pressure from the Labour movement here, particularly in the TUC, in favour of an appointment to the Legislative Council of persons with a trades union background, though it is accepted that they would be drawn from the independent trade unions rather than from the larger politically orientated organisations. Viewed from here, it would be desirable for the Governor to appoint such a figure when appointments are next made. This is an immediate problem but it illustrates the more general difficulty of the representation of the wage-earning population on the Council. While the Governor is fully aware of the value to the Secretary of State of such an appointment, there are real difficulties in finding a suitable or even credible figure from the very small number of independent unionists in Hong Kong (see Annex C paragraph 22). Balancing these two views is difficult and will require a decision by Ministers: but a possible solution to the immediate difficulty might be to appoint a personality so closely, publicly and personally associated with efforts to improve industrial working conditions to dispose of criticism that there is no spokesman for workers' interests in the Council. In the longer term there should be scope for appointments of persons with a background in the trade unions but care would need to be taken to avoid giving the Chinese the impression that we were seeking to undermine their own Communist unions who can be expected to continue to boycott participation in Hong Kong Government activity at any level. The more promising approach would be

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