TNAG-1284-FCO40-1636-Constitutional-development-in-Hong-Kong-1984 — Page 297

should however follow the line of gradually moving to

indirect elections; this will still allow us the possibility

of moving to direct elections in the 1990's.

9. In discussing Agenda Item 2 with the Chinese I propose

that we should take the following line:

(a)

(b)

(c)

(d)

we propose to move progressively to a system under which the membership of the Legislative Council would be

indirectly elected under a collegiate system;

that each stage of the process would be open to public

consultation in Hong Kong before it was adopted;

that we would not be likely to make a decision on

whether to move to more direct elections before the

beginning of the 1990's.

in response to any claim by the Chinese that they should be consulted, we should reply that we are

simply informing them of our intentions to ensure

that there are no surprises for them without their

having an opportunity to comment on them if they so

wished;

(e) we should say that we are ready to consult with them

before moving to direct elections, reserving of course

our final decision on the issue to HMG. We should

lose nothing by such consultation because by then

there would be no point in installing a system which

the Chinese might attempt to overthrow a few years

later.

SECRET

/10.