TNAG-1331-FCO40-1758-Future-of-Hong-Kong-test-of-the-acceptability-of-the-Joint-D-1984 — Page 179

SEVNET

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acceptability of a draft agreement which was not open

to any amendment. Nevertheless, to those who have chosen

to call the consultation and assessment task "a charade"

or "a farce" we wish to say that their view was certainly

not shared by the many Hong Kong people, in different

parts of the community, whom we were able to hear discussing,

with care and concern, the draft agreement as a whole

and all its contents.

13.

Secondly, the Assessment Office was a body without

precedent. While maintaining our independence, we have

closely observed it at work, watching and listening to

its members as they discharged their functions. We have

also shared in their experience of the public response

to the draft agreement, and of the local reactions to

the consultation and assessment tasks. We present in

our Conclusions our considered judgment on the way in

which the Assessment Office has discharged its terms of

reference; but we would like to pay tribute here to the

quality of the staff of the Office, and to the integrity

and conscientiousness with which the Commissioner and

all his colleagues have done their job.

CONCLUSIONS

14.

We wish to record first that we are fully satisfied

that the Assessment Office has performed its duties impartially

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in the manner in which it had discharged

its terms of reference as a whole, and in the balanced

way in which it has assessed the views of those who are

unwilling, as well as of those who are willing, to accept

the draft agreement.