40
布政司署
HKR
430
香港下亞畢道
25 NOV
* OUR REF.: G/S/2/6 III
III
HKK 430
* YOUR REF.: H
No
PERSONAL & STAFF RESTRICTED
Dear Johm,
GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT
LOWER ALBERT ROAD
HONG KONG
17th November 1977
sary to her Hurt OLA
Ir Querill
Thutem folks Dowe owe anybody ay
R&R
W
Thank you for your letter of 8th November. I am most grateful for your attempt to discourage Mrs Cheung and her associates from a fruitless journey.
futter
news
on this?
W4.23/11
2.
I realize that their visit may generate the kind of pressures of which you speak. However, it would be a serious setback if it led to any suggestion of arbitration on the lines you mention. This letter is intended to provide you with further ammunition, as promised in my telegram No. 1149 of 16th November, to help you keep any critics at bay.
3.
As you know, we are in the process of drawing up proposals for more formalised procedures for dealing with this type of dispute. We have already had some informal discussion with the Staff Side of the Senior Civil Service Council and hope to be in a position to open more formal discussions soon. The procedures we have in mind may well have some form of arbitration as the final stage, but this would follow a thorough process of consultation, the procedures for which need to be carefully planned and then discussed and agreed with the Staff Side. Any suggestion of further ad hoc arbitration at this stage would, in my view, limit our freedom of action and prejudice the outcome of the rather tricky discussions on which we are now about to engage.
4.
The female clerk argument in your third paragraph can be effectively countered by reference to our policy of fair comparison with the private sector, which is based on yours. Although the UK temporarily had to abandon this policy because of the recent pay pause, I understand that the UK Civil Service is committed to restoring it in time for the 1979 round of Civil Service pay negotiations; and from recent press reports it appears that the Staff Side have been exerting considerable pressure (including a token strike and a meeting with the Prime Minister) for the system to be reintroduced even earlier.
JJA.B. Stewart, Esq., OBE, Foreign & Commonwealth Office, London SW1
England.
£.
/5...
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