TNAG-0648-FCO40-796-Study-of-labour-relations-in-Hong-Kong-by-Professor-H-A-Turn-1977 — Page 50

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and,

in a telegram of 15 April, he emphasised his opposition to it. His principal concerns (and ours) are -

A.

B.

That the study should be satisfactorily and carefully completed by Professor Turner and that he should retain the academic and independent status which he provides.

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.

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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 dispassionate 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.

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