TNAG-0801-FCO40-1005-Immigration-from-China-to-Hong-Kong-1978 — Page 13

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

London SW1A 2AH

13 June 1978

From The Minister of State

THE RT HON THE LORD GORONWY-ROBERTS

HKK .341

RECEIVED IN REGISTRY NO. 51

15 JUN 1978

PA

REGITRY Action Taken

DESK OFFICER INDEX

69

Jane Magan.

Your Private Secretary wrote to mine on 1 June about the letter you had received from your constituent, Mr J S Fairey, who asked about the policy of repatriating immigrants who attempt to enter Hong Kong illegally from China.

O

While I can understand that this policy should arouse Mr Fairey's concern, the problem is more complex than it appears at first sight. Hong Kong is a very small territory with a total land area of less than 400 square miles. Its population has grown from 600,000 in 1946 to over 44 million today, mainly because of its readiness to accept immigrants from China. As a result, it now has one of the highest pop- ulation densities in the world in its urban areas. The provision of adequate social services for a population which has grown so rapidly would be an immense task even in normal circumstances. But by the early 1970's this task was being made virtually impossible in the face of the continuing influx of people from China: by 1973 legal immigrants were arriving from China at a rate of about 56,000 a year, while illegal immigrants were thought to be entering at a rate of about 35,000 a year (only an estimated 20% of illegal immigrants are actually caught at the border: the rest succeed in evading detection and are only discovered when they surface later in the urban areas).

Faced with this situation, the Hong Kong Government decided that, in the interests of those who were already in Hong Kong, something had to be done to limit the rate at which people were arriving. An informal understanding was reached with the Chinese authorities, who agreed to reduce the number of legal immigrants. At the same time the Government decided to start returning to China any would-be immigrants who were caught trying to enter Hong Kong illegally (this policy only applies to those who are actually caught at the border: once they reach the urban areas they are allowed to stay). These two measures together reduced the flow of immigrants to manageable proportions.

/When