TNAG-1307-FCO40-1664-Future-of-Hong-Kong-1984 — Page 128

CODE 18-77

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Reference...

FROM: R F Wye

Far Eastern Section Research Department

DATE: 31 January 1984

cc: Mr Burrows

68

____MKK040|1

RECEIVED IN POOL

1ES 1984

without encls

Legal Advisers Mr Hum HKD

1 1

Mr Morris HKD Mr Hoare HKD

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t t

Mrs Priest HKD

DESK OFFICER

PA

REGISTRY

Action ?

CH1012

FUTURE OF HONG KONG: JI PENGFEI'S REMARKS TO PROFESSOR MUN KIN-CHOK

1.

Please refer to your minute of 23 January to Mr Walker. You should by now have received a printed copy of the Constitution from Mr Burrows. In addition to Article 67 (and of course Article 31), may I direct your attention to Articles 112-122 which deal with the organs of self-government of national autonomous areas, and Articles 95-111 which deal with the local People's Congress and Governments at different levels. In this regard I attach a copy of the Organic Law for Local People's Congresses and Governments (as revised in December 1982. It contains provisions which describe the functions and powers of local government (especially Articles 7, 28 and 35). These provisions are as you will see applicable to autonomous regions as well as to provinces.

2. As for your specific questions in paragraph 3, the answer to the second is that as far as I have been able to determine, without an exhaustive (and probably unprofitable) search, there have been no reported instances of the NPC Standing Committee annulling local regulations on the grounds that they contravened the Constitution. It is of course possible that this may have occurred without it ever being reported. In his report on the work of the NPC Standing Committee to the 5th Session of the 5th NPC in December 1982, Yang Shangkun revealed that between November 1979 and September.. 1982, 355 local laws had been made by various provinces and autonomous regions and had been 'reported to the NPC Standing Committee for the record'. In an earlier report on the work of the NPC Standing Committee in December 1981, Yang Shangkun said that Guangdong and Fujian had been authorised to pass economic legislation for their Special Economic Zones and had been instructed to report it to the NPC Standing Committee and to the State Council 'for the record'. The implication appears to be that the NPC Standing Committee's supervisory powers over local legislation have been exercised in a purely formal way. But one should be weary of reading too much into Chinese statements. It is clear that as recently as January 1982 the whole business of the supervision of sub-provincial level legislation was unfamiliar to Chinese officials. A People's Daily article of 11 January 1982 complained that: 'as no leadership connections exist between the different levels of People's Congress, documents approved by a lower-level People's Congress or Standing Committee do not necessarily get reported to a higher level for review'.

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