TNAG-2893-FCO40-4166-Hong-Kong-localisation-of-laws-merchant-shipping-and-carria-1993 — Page 87

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i. AUG 1993

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FROM:

• REGISTRY Action Taken

Jill Barrett

Assistant Legal Adviser K174 270 3381

DATE:

12 August 1993

&

Mr Marshall HKD

LOCALISATION OF LAWS: MERCHANT SHIPPING

1. I refer to your minute of 3 August concerning HKG's two draft consultation papers, on liner conferences and carriage of goods by sea respectively.

2.

You queried the wording in para 6 of the liner conferences paper and para 7 of the carriage of goods by sea paper. agree that the last sentence of each are likely to be read as proposing that the localisation of the legislation should proceed before agreement has been reached in the IRO Sub-Group on continuation of the treaties it is designed to implement. It might well displease the Chinese since it appears to preempt the IRO discussion.

3.

One

These paragraphs may have been deliberately so worded. possible reason is that HKG have taken the view that the principle of continuation of the IROS is already settled and that all that it is necessary to discuss is the action to be taken by the two sides internationally to ensure this. This is certainly the inference I would draw from the paragraph as a whole. It would follow from this view that it is a foregone conclusion that localisation of the legislation is necessary, and also that discussion on the form of it need not await the decision on the mechanism for continuation of the IROS.

4. Another possibility is that HKG have despaired of the prospect of obtaining Chinese agreement on the continuation of the whole batch of merchant shipping conventions in time to allow for the localisation process to be completed before 1997. They may be hoping that the Chinese will agree more quickly to single legislative proposals, and that they can at least have the legislation in place in time, even if the position regarding the IROS remains unresolved.

it is

5. I would suggest you ask Hong Kong if our reading of the paragraphs in question is as they intended, and if so, the thinking behind it. I suspect that, whatever the logic, unrealistic to expect Chinese agreement to localisation proposals in advance of agreement on the substance of the corresponding IROS. I assume that in previous cases the discussion on localisation has always followed agreement on the IROs, but please let me know if this assumption is incorrect.

6.

Unless Hong Kong have persuasive reasons for retaining the