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in recent years in developing social services in Hong Kong and further improvements are being introduced all the time. The Governor's speech to the Legislative Council on 11 October, when he described the Hong Kong Government's plans for expansion into the mid 1980's outlined an impressive set of proposals in housing, education, social security and welfare and health services. If you would like further information on these subjects, or indeed on anything else concerned with developments in Hong Kong, you might like to contact the Hong Kong Government Office in London, whose address is:
6 Grafton Street London W1
(telephone 01 499 9821)
You also expressed concern at the fact that Hong Kong British citizens are not free to work and live in Britain if they wish to do so.
But this misunderstands the nature of a Hong Kong British passport; such a passport gives the holder the right to re-enter Hong Kong at any time to live and work, in the same way as the British passport of a person who derives UK citizenship from close connection with the UK entitles the holder at any time to return to the UK. But there is no reason why such a passport should give the holder special privileges in respect of other countries, though in fact Hong Kong British citizens do enjoy certain privileges in their ability to come to Britain to work, as Mr O'Keefe explained in his reply to your earlier letter.
In your latest letter you revert to your earlier suggestion a Working Party should be set up to make recommendations on policy towards Hong Kong. I do not however think that there is any need to create a special body for this purpose since policy towards Hong Kong is kept constantly under review here in London in close consultation with the Government of Hong Kong.
Yours sianly
Dund süren
that
David Stephen Political Adviser
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