TNAG-1560-FCO40-2124-Future-of-Hong-Kong-nationality-and-passports-Hong-Kong-(Br-1986 — Page 15

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26 February 1986

PS PS/Lady Young Dr Wilson

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HONG KONG: NATIONALITY ORDER IN COUNCIL

1.

Mr Renton called on Mr Waddington at the Home Office this evening to discuss the draft minute from the Home Secretary to the Prime Minister and OD (K) colleagues. You were also present. The agenda for the meeting was essentially my letter of 24 February to PS/Mr Waddington (copy attached).

2. On the passport endorsement, Mr Waddington was content to go for the second alternative footnote for the draft leaflet. He was also content for the Governor to be consulted informally before the Home Secretary wrote round to OD(K). Before you telegraph Hong Kong, however, Home Office officials will first check with the Attorney General's office that there is unlikely to be any legal difficulty with the endorsement which has now been agreed between the FCO and the Home Office.

3. On likely reactions in the Lords to a decision not to

grant citizenship to the non-Chinese minorities, Mr

Waddington said he had taken the advice of the Lords

Whips. They did not envisage any serious difficulty in securing the Order's passage through the Upper House.

4. There was a brief discussion of arguments to be used in Parliament in justification of a decision to turn down the non-Chinese Mr Waddington took the point about the problems which the "floodgates" line posed in Hong Kong terms, but said he feared that he might have to use it if Xpressed.

5.

Mr Renton suggested that a more quotable reassurance about the future of the minorities might help to sweeten the pill for the non-Chinese. Mr Waddington agreed that the "compassion element" of his speech in the Commons should be strengthened, though he did not wish to give any indication that future governments would be ready to amend the BNA.

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