PERSONAL
AND CONFIDENT LAL
A
From the
Senior British Trade Commissioner
His Excellency Sir David Wilson GCMG
Governor of Hong Kong Government House Hong Kong
27 March 1991
090/3
18
Dea David,
Thank you for your letter of 25 March. seen the Sunday Telegraph article.
I had not previously Robert Tyerman came to
see me in my office a few weeks ago. He subsequently telephoned me from London. I gave him quite a lot of figures on our trade performance. I gave them as a positive indicator of our successful trade achievements. He seems to have used most of them but has given them a more negative slant. The quotations ascribed to me are not so much taken out of context; they are not words that I used.
When asked to explain why the United States sold so much more to Hong Kong than did the UK, I said that they made strong efforts, spent a lot of money in promoting their products, and were generally aggressive in the market. I said that they received considerable official backing in these efforts. By that I meant that the Consulate General's commercial sector is large and active. I did not say, nor even imply, that there was anything unfair about this, nor that anyone in Hong Kong, least of all yourself, had been influenced or affected in any decision by such support. I am quite sure that I did not say "they really take the gloves off" which is simply not an expression I would use in this context.
The juxtaposition of the factual point about Chinese fears that too many contracts in the airport project could go to the British, which of course is widely known and quoted, with a comment on international investment in Hong Kong was not mine. I did say something along the lines that Hong Kong would doubt- less welcome investment, and participation in large contracts, from a variety of countries, and that this would help ensure that Hong Kong remained an international centre, but I did not imply that special favours were given to firms from these countries. Nor to be fair do I think that that quotation actually implies that.
PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL
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