TNAG-1334-FCO40-1766-Future-of-Hong-Kong-legislation-1984 — Page 151

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Gibraltar during the passage of the British Nationality Bill.

If the House of Lords were to decline to give us the necessary

affirmative resolution for an Order in Council containing cut-off

dates on the grounds that these were offensive to the Act our scheme

for implementing the UK Memorandum would fall apart.

3. As regards paragraph 12 I entirely agree and should no doubt

have perceived the point myself.

4.

•

As regards paragraph 13, I can see a certain logic in doing

what you suggest but are not sure that it is strictly speaking

necessary. So far as the terms of the UK Memorandum are concerned

I should have thought one might reasonably take the view on the

face of it that we can do what we like with anyone who is not a

Hong Kong BDTC immediately before the handover date. On that

basis we could allow people who had acquired the new status to

keep it even though their qualifying BDTC status was lost before

the handover date. You may say that an implication to the contrary

must be read into the UK Memorandum, but even if that is the case

would the Chinese be likely to take offence if that happened?

Apart from that, it seems to us that the situation which you

envisage will in practice not arise.

There are only two ways in

which a Hong Kong BDTC could lose his BDTC status as you envisage,

by deprivation or by renunciation.

We would certainly not want

to deprive a person of his BDTC status without depriving him of

his new status also. So far as renunciation is concerned, it seems

inconceivable to us that a person would ever want to renounce his

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