TNAG-2050-FCO40-2920-Visits-by-Lord-Caithness--Minister-of-State-for-Foreign-and--1990 — Page 70

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2 1 NOV 1990

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Papaithvis

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

London SW1A 2AH

15 November 1990

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Den Me Lau,

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Lord Caithness has asked me to thank you for your letter of 17 September about various issues of concern to members of your Association. Lord Caithness was glad to have had the opportunity to meet you and other representatives of the Senior Non-Expatriate Officers Association while he was in Hong Kong and to hear your views at first hand.

You express concern about certain aspects of the selection criteria under the British Nationality (Hong Kong) Act. As you know, the Order-in-Council setting out details of the selection procedure has now been approved by Parliament.

Firstly, you suggest that the maximum points available for British links should have been raised from 50 to 250, so that civil servants would have an edge over their private sector counterparts. The selection criteria were designed to ensure that civil servants will receive a substantial number of passports under the scheme. We are satisfied that the points allocated for Crown Service under the Hong Kong Government should give civil servants an edge over similarly qualified private sector applicants where they compete in the same quota relating to a specified occupational group. If the number of British links points had been increased as much as You suggest, the effect would have been to give a disproportionate number of passports to civil servants and

mployees of British companies, leaving almost none for the rest of the private sector.

econdly, you suggest that the prime age band should have een extended to cover officers in the age group 30-45. No

Old deny that officers who are now in their mid or late

will have a valuable role to play during the onal period. But it was decided to give maximum to the 30-41 age group because they will be in a key cket during the transitional

Senior Non-Expatriate Officers Association

CGO East Wing

bert Road

ng

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