RESTRICTED
7.
8.
9.
10.
B
11.
That nothing should occur to jeopardise the remaining and very important items in the Hong Kong Government's 1977 programme of labour legislation which will come before Legislative Council in June/July (particularly Bills providing for increased severance allowances and one week's paid annual holiday). The Governor expects considerable opposition to these measures and anything that could be used to give substance to allegations that the Hong Kong, Government are legislating under UK trade union pressure would be damaging.
Professor Turner is also being consulted
there are difficulties
in communication as he is taking a year's sabbatical at the University of Sydney and he is expected to oppose the proposal and point to the difficulties of incorporating non-academics in a programme of continuous work and research which is now reaching its final stages.
The FCO view has consistently been that if a fair and dis- passionate assessment of the trade union situation in Hong Kong is to be made, the arrangements should be as informal and unpublicised as possible. Hence the project should take the form of a piece of academic research directed at producing an unbiased and probing analysis of the trade union movement and industrial relations situation in Hong Kong and relating the findings of that analysis to the political, industrial and social circumstances of the Colony.
There are also cautionary political factors against the TUC's argument. A British trade unionist could not count on gaining a response from the communist unions and would encounter the same problems experienced by Professor Turner arising from the major split in the Hong Kong trade union movement between pro-Peking and pro-Taiwan factions. The TUC may argue that only a trade unionist could establish effective contact with the communist trade unions. We know the TUC have picked up a comment by Professor Hart, one of Professor Turner's collaborators, that "the majority of trade unionists in Hong Kong had no interest in talking to people like ourselves".)
However, criticism in Hong Kong of the current state of industrial relations in the UK is such that official and business circles in Hong Kong would be opposed to the appointment of a British trade union (and employers') representative, and local co-operation would thus be in jeopardy. Without that co-opera- tion, little of practical application is likely to result from the study. A minority report would not be helpful.
An undertaking that the TUC's views on his interim study would be made known to Professor Turner and that the OLCC would be given an early opportunity to study Professor Turner's final report might be helpful. His date of return to the UK is not known but he might be asked to discuss his findings with the TUC when he is again in London.
/Item 4
3
RESTRICTED
No comments yet.
Private notes are available after approval.