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asked, although Mr Jones made the point that to his
knowledge none of the PRC companies, who had associated
themselves with the various consortia, had in fact received
formal PRC approval to do so.
3.
Mr Jones continued that the preparatory costs for a tender (in the case of the platform these will amount to
£11/2
-
£2 million) would rise steeply if Balfour Beatty were to pursue the fifteen or so possible contracts in which they
are interested. He asked Mr Burns, without he said wishing
to appear to be trying to tilt the odds in anyone's
particular favour, whether any of the PADS contracts had
already been "dedicated" by the Hong Kong Government to
British or other interests. If this were the case he
explained, it would make Balfour Beatty's task in deciding
which contracts to pursue, that much easier. Balfour Beatty were already deeply committed to huge projects elsewhere in
the world and had no need or desire to waste money and time
on bids that had little or no prospect of success. Balfour
Beatty were not interested in the fixed link, but in other elements eg rail and hydrotunnels. Independently of
Sir Robert Davidson, Balfour Beatty were already extending
themselves into two major projects in China, a hydro project
and dam on the Yellow River.
4. Mr Burns responded that he knew of no understandings or
deals into which the Hong Kong Government had entered to
dedicate any of the contracts to anyone. It was up to the
Hong Kong Government to award contracts according to their
own established tendering procedures. Whereas HMG had a keen interest in seeing British companies win contracts, it was in Hong Kong's interests to take account not only of price but also of reliability and ability to meet the
timescale required: for Hong Kong there was also some
benefit in having a broad range of international companies
involved. But HMG were not aware of any prior commitments
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