TNAG-1624-FCO40-2238-Relations-between-Hong-Kong-and-China-1987 — Page 75

B

fund in making a BV claim and inviting claimants the Treasury Solicitor would come close to providing a means whereby this would be achieved;

ii)

in the Russian case it was known that specific large claims fell under this heading and that considerable delays in the final distribution would arise if they were allowed;

iii) the intervention of the Treasury Soliicitor in a BV claim would cause additional administrative cost which would ultimately be borne by the fund. Those otherwise entitled to â share of the fund would thus suffer a detriment for the benefit of a remote class of claimants;

iv) if the BV distribution followed normal practice no distinction would be made between British and non-British beneficiaries- it was definitely not intended that there should be non-British beneficiaries of the fund.

As the vast majorty of the China claims are not so old as the Russian claims (40 as opposed to 70 years) there would presumably be fewer potential claimant companies that were dissolved over 20 years ago. In fact we are aware of only one former company whose claims fall into the bona vacantia category in the case of China,

(although there could be others that we have never heard of). This is the Shanghai Waterworks Ltd which was removed from the Companies Register in 1967/68. It has come to our attention because Mr Carter, the former Managing Director, having failed to persuade former major shareholders to revive the company at the time of the 1980 registration, submitted himself a claim to the FCC on the company's behalf. For the purposes of registration the FCC were willing to accept it, but without commitment to whether it would be accepted for a distribution exercise. Mr Carter also was in correspondence with the FCO at the time. It is possible that he may misconstrue a statement by a member of Claims Department in a letter to him that "the FCO had no intention of letting anything go by default because it does not fit neatly into any specific category" into some sort of assurance that his company's creditors and shareholders would get some recompense at the distribution stage. The context was, however, the registration exercise currently taking place preliminarly to the opening of a claims negotiation. it implied no commitment regarding distribution.

In my view

The other complication is that the Treasury, who take the lead on bona vacantia policy, were not altogether happy about the exclusion in the case of the Russian distribution, and may possibly be resistant to its repetition here.

I should be grateful for confirmation that the Minister is content, subject to Treasury agreement, to the bona vacantia

/exclusion

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