TNAG-2077-FCO40-2957-Hong-Kong-culture-1990 — Page 28

布政司署

香港下亞厘畢道

PERSONAL & IN STRICT CONFIDENCE

本署檔號 Our Ref.:

PA SCR 12/1162/87

來函檔號 Your Ref:

C

Julian Davey Esq

Director

The British Council

Easey Commercial Building

255 Hennessy Road

Hong Kong

Dear

Julian,

GOVERNMENT SECRETARIAT

LOWER ALBERT ROAD

HONG KONG

6 July 1990

FUTURE OF THE BRITISH COUNCIL IN HONG KONG

1.

2.

Thank you for your letter of 7 June.

As you know, the Joint Declaration makes clear in Section X of Annex 1, which deals with culture and education, that institutions of all kinds may retain their autonomy and continue to recruit staff and use teaching materials from outside the SAR. This in our view provides for the continuation of organisations such as the British Council and, as you mentioned in your letter, we have hitherto considered that it was preferable that: no special approach should be made to the Chinese.

3.

We agree with your lawyers that one means of providing the Council with a new legal basis for after 1997 would be incorporation under a special ordinance. As you point out this is a route which has been taken by bodies such as the British Red Cross Society, the Community Chest and the YMCA. would be a high-profile route.

4.

But it

Another option, which would be less high-profile, would be the possibility of registration as an oversea company

Section 333 of that Ordinance under the Companies Ordinance. allows for branches of foreign bodies to have a legal basis in Hong Kong if a copy of the document incorporating the parent company in the country of origin is provided to the Registrar of Companies. Although the British Council is incorporated in the UK by royal charter, our own lawyers do not think that this would preclude the Council høre from registration as an oversea company, since section 333 specifically refers, in its description of documents incorporating overseas bodies, to "charters". If the Council were to adopt this procedure, it