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London for talks with the Treasury, perhaps in late January or early February. But this would depend on their being a
reasonable basis for discussion. I warned him that it was
not impossible that Ministers would conclude that the issue was too difficult and postpone decisions for the time being.
4. Mr Shipley (and Mr Wiggham, who joined us at this point) were concerned about Lu Ping's public comments on Hong Kong
Civil Service Pensions. They feared that, although Lu Ping had not yet fully shown his hand, the issue of the cost of pensions for the Hong Kong SAR might in due course assume major proportions, as the PADS issue had done. I reminded them that we had promised the Chinese a briefing on pensions matters in December. (Subsequently Guo Fengmin referred to this in his closing remarks at JLG XVII.) Mr Shipley said
that a briefing would be likely to take place in early
January. He would keep us informed over this.
ARPar
A R Paul
BAGAEA/2
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