TNAG-2766-FCO40-3983-Hong-Kong-and-the-media-interviews--press-briefings-and-the--1993 — Page 23

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Background

A,B 3. Jonathan Dimbleby has written separate letters to the

Secretary of State and to Mr Goodlad. He would like to discuss the series of television programmes he is making on Hong Kong, for transmission after 1997, and UK policy on Hong Kong. He has asked also to be put in touch with senior officials dealing with Hong Kong and he has raised again with Mr Goodlad the question of filming a policy meeting on Hong Kong.

C

4. When the Governor was last in the UK, in November 1992,

Dimbleby asked to film the Secretary of State's meeting with the

Governor, the Ambassador to Peking and officials. Because of

the highly sensitive nature of the meeting, it was agreed that the presence of cameras would be inhibitive and filming inappropriate at that time. Mr Hum's minute of 13 November 1992

refers. The Secretary of State wrote to Dimbleby to explain the

background to his decision and offered to help him with the

programme at a later date.

5. Dimbleby has also discussed the project with Mr Goodlad. The Secretary of State may wish to have a meeting with Dimbleby in the first instance. Mr Goodlad might like to follow this up with a further meeting to introduce Dimbleby to Christopher Hum and Peter Ricketts.

6. There are few, regular policy meetings on Hong Kong at ministerial level because of diary constraints. The first suitable opportunity for such a meeting will probably be at the time of the Governor's next visit to London in April. The debate in LegCo on the Governor's proposals for constitutional

development will be underway. A meeting between the Secretary of State and the Governor may well cover equally sensitive matters as the last meeting in November 1992. It might be