TNAG-2032-FCO40-2895-Visit-by-Douglas-Hurd--Secretary-of-State-for-Foreign-and-Co-1990 — Page 79

POREIGN SUG:

SPRRCH

HONG KONG GENERAL CIAMBER OF COMMERCE 15 JANUARY 1990

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POREIGN SECRETARY (CONTD):

before the British people, before our colleagues in Parliament,

about Hong Kong, about the needs of Hong Kong, about the prospects

of Hong Kong.

When I talked about a "crude and ignorant caricature", 1, was

not actually thinking about the passport issue at all -

I was

thinking about the caricature which suggests that Hong Kong is

simply a matter of piling up money and I suggested that the Charity

Walk and the huge explusion of voluntary community work going on in

Hong Kong corrects that caricature, but that is just one point.

There are many other points about Hong Kong which we must get

across. by "e") mean certainly British Ministere, people who know

Hong Kong, British Members of Parliament who know Hong Kong, but

also yourselves. I think it is crucial, not just because of this

particular Bill but over the next year when there will be many

་

difficult decisius to be taken, that the world British public

opinion, Americe public opinion

should get from you direct, from

the horse's mouth, clear accounts, visible wituess, of what is

actually happening here, what your plans are, what your hopes are

and what your trustrations are.

I think the question is an excellent one and I think it

behoves all of us Governor, Foreign Secretary, but also everybody

in this room to think of our own ways in which we can get through

more vividly and more accurately than before the true picture of

what Hong Kong in 1990 is really about.