TNAG-1596-FCO40-2181-Constitutional-development-in-Hong-Kong-1988 — Page 112

I am sorry that we are obliged to ask the Secretary of State to consider such a complicated set of papers at this particular time. The need to do so, however, is dictated by the timetable for the Basic Law Drafting Committee meetings. The BLDC special group's meeting which will consider the

political system will take place from 31 July - 2 August in

If we do not get our ideas in beforehand the group may write in unhelpful draft provisions which it will be subsequently difficult to change.

any event.

2. As the submission makes clear, the papers are contri- butions to Chinese thinking in an area where we have no locus standi under the Joint Declaration. They are thus quite different from the various papers which we have given to the Chinese on issues which are properly the concern of the Joint Liaison Group and which are the subject of negotiations between the two sides. For this reason, and 'because the

purpose of the papers is to advocate retention of as much as possible of the present system, the Secretary of State may feel it unnecessary to consult ministerial colleages. The time

constraints would in any case make this difficult.

3. Paragraph 10 of the submission adequately describes the ground covered in the papers, while paragraph 11 deals with a

point where we still have a difference with EXCO. There is one other point of explanation which may be helpful. The third paper suggests that part of the legislature might comprise "members elected by a system of elections based on geographic constituencies, either on the present basis or by direct elections". formulation was chosen to avoid giving the impression that, contrary to what we have been telling the Chinese in connection with the Green Paper, we have concluded that the SAR legislature should include a directly elected element and that we are therefore pushing this concept.

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17 July 1987

RJT McLaren