IN CONFIDENCE
Mr Cattenach, Director of the Thomson Foundation, outlined the function of the Foundation and talked about their training programme in China for correspondents working overseas. He did not know Hong Kong well but assumed adequate training facilities were available for journalists there, but Mr Poon surprised him by saying that better training was in fact required.
Mr Cattenach promised to visit Hong Kong during his next trip to China and meet the group again and perhaps discuss training programmes with the Hong Kong Journalism Training Board. Discussions centred around the changes which will occur in 1997 and fears that the Hong Kong press will be controlled by the Government. Mr Cattenach agreed that there would inevitably be changes but some of these would doubtless be good, and some less welcome.
CONCLUSION
The group were somewhat subdued on their return from their regional tour and commented little on the visits. This may have been due to tiredness, although when pressed Mr Lau said they had not been pleased with all aspects of the regional tour. He said the visit to Salford University had been useful and interesting, but he thought they had met too many people from the Chinese community in Manchester a meeting with one person would have sufficed. He thought the Lord Mayor of Manchester had not been briefed on their visit as she gave the impression of not knowing why they were there. Instead of discussions at the council offices he would have preferred to attend a council meeting to view proceedings. During the programme discussion they had queried the relevance of the visit to the House of Hardy and, following the visit Mr Lau commented that, as overseas investment was sought in the north of England, he believed a visit to a company such as Nissan would have been more useful. I do not know to what extent Mr Lau's comments echoed those of the rest of the group, but believe he was speaking on their behalf, although I think he was more critical than the others.
I believe the group were pleased with the London programme, although they said they would have appreciated a visit to a national newspaper. I feel, however, they may have misunderstood the purpose of the visit and the familiarisation aspect. Preoccupied with fears for the future of Hong Kong after 1997 and apprehensive about their own futures and careers, they only appeared to be interested in discussions relevant to Hong Kong and her future, and showed less interest in those meetings featuring aspects of British life and industry, unrelated to Hong Kong. Whilst it is difficult to generalise where a group is concerned, this is the impression I gained and some of the criticisms outlined above reinforce this view.
Valerie Cable
Escorting Officer London
3 December 1987
3
IN CONFIDENCE
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