TNAG-2738-FCO40-3951-Hong-Kong-Letters-Patent-1993-1993 — Page 133

CONFIDENTIAL

2

asked the

Administration

whether the gazettal for the latter could take place in time to enable them to amend the

Standing orders in October. (They know nothing about the amendments relating to the 1995 LegCo.)

Accordingly, we

have explored the possibility of

proceeding now with the gazettal of those amendments which

deal with the stand-in arrangements, whilst leaving to а

later date the gazettal of the amendments relating to the

1995 Legco. However, legal advice is that all the

amendments must be yazetted as a whole at the cannot be split into parts. I gather this is

of the FCO Legal Advisers.

same time and also the view

This being the legal position, and given that it would be unsatisfactory for the new

the new stand-in arrangements

for the Legco President to be held up indefinitely by the

progress of the talks, we believe it is worth considering

the option of seeking Privy Council's approval to revoke the signed amendments, and in parallel to make two separate

sets of self-contained amendments (one on the 1995 LegCo,

the other on the stand-in arrangements for the LegCo

President). These two sets of amendments can then be

gazetted separately as and when appropriate. As discussed,

we understand that the Privy Council will next meet on 27

October.

Whilst the option outlined above will no doubt give us additional flexibility, we appreciate that making

submissions to the Privy Council will involve rather

tedious procedures. Also, given that

given that the Council will not