2.
CONFIDENTIAL
From the Secretary of State
In any case, the fact remains that OD agreed on 10 July to the Foreign Secretary's proposal that we should include in the total of 10,000 any refugees who arrived here after being picked up at sea by British ships and this was endorsed by Cabinet. It is simply not good enough to say that because of administrative difficulties which have now been thought of this decision cannot be honoured. I therefore hope you will agree that, for the sake of the Government's credibility with the shipping industry, the Secretary of State should reply to Mr Ropner saying that there will now be no difficulty in including any Indo-Chinese refugees picked up at sea by British ships within the quota we have agreed to take.
Finally my Secretary of State has particularly asked me to say that he was concerned at the tone of your letter. The priority facing Ship-Masters is to save drowning men and women, and it should not be beyond our wit to sort out the administrative.... problems which arise humanely and consistently without our public commitments. Mr Nott was especially concerned at the implication that persons saved from drowning could be designated "queue-jumpers" and furthermore might have to be abandoned if "the quota has been exhausted".
I am sending copies of this letter to No 10 and to the Private Secretary to the Home Secretary.
Yours sincerely John Symes
JMD SYMES
Private Secretary
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