TNAG-2791-FCO40-4030-Relations-between-Hong-Kong-and-China.-With-maps-1993 — Page 123

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On a less happy note the consequences of failure should also

be noted. Britain stands to lose a great deal if matters should

turn out badly. The fear is that a collapse of confidence could

be rapidly followed by a spiralling down

down of the economy, а

breakdown of social order, Chinese intervention and the flight

of Hong Kong people what the previous governor, now Lord

Wilson, called the 'Armageddon Scenario'. A public disaster of

that magnitude would inevitably affect the standing of the

government at home in possibly an election year and Britain's

prestige in the eyes of its allies could be greatly damaged.

designated

Britain also has a moral obligation arising out of its

responsibility for the 5.8 million people for whom Hong Kong is

their home. Many of them had had full rights of entry into the

UK and a right to UK citizenship until the 1962 Commonwealth

Immigrants Act and the Immigration Act of 1971

and they

regarded the British Nationality Act of 1981 which

them as British Dependent Territory Citizen as a further blow to

their status. These industrious, educated and highly productive

people who have flourished under British protection, being either

refugees or children of refugees from Communist China, had a

tacit social contract with the British in that they would not

challenge the colonial rule and that the colonial rulers would

keep them free from Communist chinese control. But by the terms

of the negotiations the people of Hong Kong will be handed over

to the sovereign authority of the Chinese Communists in 1997

without having had the opportunity to play a direct part in the

negotiations except as influences upon the British or Chinese