File
SECRET UK EYES A
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
London SW1A 2AH
Ref: D/SEC (0) (C) 6/7 Ref:
Date: 28 January 1993
HKA 063/1
1
M L Howard Esq
D/SEC(O) (C)
Room 5314
Main Building MOD
Dear Martin,
$
02 FEB 1993
270-2647
FA
LA
DESK OFFICE!
LX
THE HONG KONG GARRISON WITHDRAWAL PLAN
1.
Thank you for sending me a copy of the draft Chiefs of Staff paper "The Rundown of the Hong Kong Garrison to 1997". I wanted to feed in a number of working-level comments at this stage. I would like to put the papers to our Ministers at the same time as you submit to yours. Perhaps we can keep in touch on that.
2. We were somewhat surprised to find from paragraph 11 of the paper that the Hong Kong Government's 65% of the Full costs of the Garrison is greater than the Long Term Costing costs of maintaining the Garrison in the current financial year. Would it be fair to say that the MOD is making a profit from the Garrison? I also believe that Para 11 should spell out more clearly the political constraints on the HKG in securing funding from LegCo. Since the DCA was last agreed (just) in Legco there have been major changes. The Government can no longer rely on the conservative faction to support proposals in LegCo which are electorally unpopular. The liberals will not necessarily fulfil this role. Funding the garrison is not politically popular, not least since the Police have (as your paper notes) now taken over all the day to day operational roles of the land element. There is therefore a need for the HKG to be able to show a declining trend for the "full costs" of the Garrison. Otherwise, LegCo could simply decline to vote the funds. The Governor has no reserve powers over finance.
SECRET UK EYES A
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