TNAG-0944-FCO40-1163-Future-of-Hong-Kong-1980 — Page 157

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a view at this stage. But it would obviously be helpful to all of

us at the meeting, and might narrow the issues to be considered by

you afterwards, if I could go to it armed with a preliminary

indication of your thinking.

As you will remember, the proposal which was previously before

you (ie that there should be an Order in Council which conferred

the power to grant indeterminate leases of land in the New Territories

and which also conferred an indeterminate power to govern the New

Territories) was objected to by the Chinese, and it has now been

abandoned. In his minute to the Governor of 2 July (which is at

Flag A behind Mr. Rushford's letter to me of 22 July) and in the

longer Opinion which is immediately behind that, Mr. Griffiths

analyses the various possibilities now open to us. The proposals

that are likely to be put forward for your approval will presumably

be based on that anlysis and next Friday's discussion of it.

V

I have to say, with respect, that I do not agree with all the

reasoning or, at any rate, with the formulation of the reasoning"

in Mr. Griffiths's Opinion. In particular, it seems to me that m

it does not sufficiently distinguish, at certain points, between

the question, on the one hand, of how we could exercise the act of

State that would be involved in our claiming a wider jurisdiction

in the New Territories than we have previously claimed and the

question, on the other hand, of how we could exercise the further

powers in domestic law which derived from that wider jurisdiction.

I also think that the discussion of the possible relevance of the

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