TNAG-0576-FCO40-709-Visits-of-UK-officials-to-Hong-Kong-1977 — Page 168

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MPs and the TUC on the question of textile imports from Hong Kong; and the shirt problem is particularly acute. A good slice of the Mass Transit Railway business would help HMG to resist the pressure over shirt imports and provide a useful counter-argument to any

future criticism over Hong Kong imports. We recognise that asking the Governor to help is unorthodox; but this is a preferable course to that of pursuing the shirts question further.

9. If the Governor seeks to argue that the invisibles account produces equality in the balance of payments as a whole we recognise that the balance of trade is not the whole story: but the invisibles

account is difficult to quantify and in any case provides no answer

to the criticism that the imbalance of trade creates unemployment here.

Hong Kong and Indian Ocean Department

27 April 1976

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CONFIDENTIAL

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