9. Mrs Cheung, accompanied by the Vice-Chairman of SATA, Miss So, have visited this country to present their case. They have so far enlisted the support of four trade unions in the public sector, NUPE, ASTMS, CPSA and NALGO, officials in the International Departments of the TUC and Labour Party and a group of MPs, as well as having had a mention in the "Financial Times" and the promise of an interview in this week's "Labour Weekly".
10. On 16 January, Mrs Cheung and Miss So called on Mr Hurst, the Overseas Labour Adviser. It became clear that the two ladies
accepted that independent arbitration would be the ideal solution but was not a practical solution at the present. Nevertheless, they may well be prepared to advise their members to accept the Hong Kong Government's present offer, without prejudice, pending arbitration when this becomes possible. This would be conditional on the Hong Kong Government making some concession on one of the other grievances: possibilities are the minimum entry point and the level for proficiency payments. In addition to normalizing working relations, those in dispute could receive the back pay which, they claim, amounts to some HK$4,000 (£500).
THE TURNER REPORT ON LABOUR RELATIONS
11. In April 1975 the Secretary of State met members of the Labour Party National Executive Committee (NEC), who were critical of the state of labour relations in Hong Kong. As a result, after discussion involving the TUC, CBI, NEC and Hong Kong, Professor H A Turner (Burton Professor of Industrial Relations at Cambridge) who had previous experience of overseas assignments, was commissioned in June 1976 to carry out an independent study.
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12. Professor Turner's terms of reference were to study and describe labour relations and to identify any impediments to the development of effective trades unions, employees' organizations and collective bargaining which made no firm recommendation. He completed an interim study at the end of 1976 and hopes to have the final report ready
by this summer.
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