TNAG-2050-FCO40-2920-Visits-by-Lord-Caithness--Minister-of-State-for-Foreign-and--1990 — Page 87

Ref: (16) in SS/C 1/21 Pt. 2

9 April 1990

The Honorable Francis Maude, MP Minister of State for Foreign and

Commonwealth Affairs United Kingdom

Dear Sir,

On behalf of the Junior Police Officers' Association of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force, I wish to express our deep regret and disappointment on the recently announced package on granting the right of abode in the UK to 50,000 Hong Kong households. puckage has turned a blind eye to the needs of the 20,000 strong Junior Police Officers in Hong Kong.

The

With a quota of only 7,000 for the seven disciplined services departments, it is quito obvious that our Junior Police Officers would only have a slin chance to obtain the right of abode under the point allocation syston, You might like to note that this would result in divisiveness among different ranks within the Force: the senior officers are given the right of abode while the majority of Junior Police Officons are not. Moreover, in the event that when some of the Junior Police Officers are eligible for the right of abode, divisiveness would also be found among the Junior Police Officers. As unity and co-operation are the most essential quality of an efficient Police force which is a requisite for Hong Xong in this transition period, any divisive element would bound to affect the stundard of serzion of the Force and thus affect the stability and prosperity of Hong Kong. In fact, having known the contents of the nationality pacinge, the Junior Police Officers started to query the rationale of making the solemn vow when we first joined the Force, since to have been deprived of the right of abode that every Junior Police Officer truly deserves. Some of our Junior Police Officers might mosolve to fulfill his responsibility half-heartedly in retaliation to the deprivation of this basic right.

I wish to reiterate that the UK Government has the responsibility to grant all Junior Police Officers including the retired Junior Police Officers the right of abode in UK in order to maintain stability in Hong Kong. This has been spelled out

../2. 2