TNAG-2198-FCO40-3152-Hong-Kong-nationality-spouses-and-widows-of-British-expatria-1990 — Page 215

MTHAPR

HICD

FROM: J Morris

#

Hong Kong Department

340 E 2 February 1990

RECEIVED IN REGISTRY

12 JUN 1990

DESK OFFICER

INDEX

PA

REGISTRY Action Taken

A R Paul, HKD

PS/Mr Maude

THE CONCERNED BRITISH EXPATRIATES ASSOCIATION: HONG KONG: LOBBYING

ON BEHALF OF SPOUSES OF BRITISH CITIZENS

8

A B

1.

Mr Julian Walsh, Chairman of the above organisation, wrote to you on 8 November and again on 29 November asking that sympathetic consideration should be given to the non-British spouses of British citizens living in Hong Kong in the nationality package then in preparation.

2. Mr Walsh sought a call on Mr Maude in December to lobby further. Mr Walsh said he was frustrated about the absence of a favourable response from the Government, whcih he believed was the result of

Home Office obduracy.

3. The Home Secretary plans to make a concession, whereby widowed spouses of British citizens would be admitted to the UK, provided they had not remarried, and subject to satisfying the criteria under existing immigration rules. But he has decided to delay announcing the concession, probably until the second reading of the Bill.

/ 4. The attached draft letter is based on the one from Home

Secretary to Conservatives Abroad in Hong Kong. Because of the Home Secretary's reluctance to make an announcement, it can be no more than a holding reply on the concessions at this stage.

Fathe

J Morris