TNAG-2924-FCO40-4199-Visits-by-Ministers-and-officials-from-third-countries-to-Ho-1993 — Page 89

HONG KONG BACKGROUND BRIEF: FEBRUARY 1993

DEVELOPMENT OF REPRESENTATIVE GOVERNMENT IN HONG KONG

The Governor's proposals

1. The Governor set out his proposals for political development in the years up to 1997 in his inaugural address to the Hong

Kong Legislative Council (LegCo) on 7 October. They are the result of wide-ranging discussions within the community, and

respond to the recent rapid growth of political awareness in

Hong Kong. Mr Patten's aim is to ensure that the 1995 LegCo

elections are broadly based, open and fair and acceptable to

Hong Kong people. People in Hong Kong now want to see a faster

pace of democratic development; at the same time they want to see continuity, so that arrangements made before 1997 will

survive beyond that. For this it is necessary, as far as possible, that any changes are compatible with the Chinese Basic

Law, the constitutional blue print for Hong Kong after 1997.

2. The Basic Law provides for a gradual increase in the number

of directly-elected seats in LegCo, beginning with 20 in 1997

and rising through 24 in 1999, 30 in 2003 to the possibility of

a fully directly-elected legislature in 2007. This means that

for the legislature elected in 1995 to serve its full term

through 1997 to 1999, (the so-called through-train) it can at

present have no more than 20 directly-elected seats. of the

other 40 seats prescribed in the Basic Law for the first post-1997 legislature, 30 are to come from functional

constituencies and 10 to be elected by an election committee.

3.

The simplest way to extend democracy in Hong Kong would be to

increase the number of directly-elected seats in LegCo. The

British Government has put this to the Chinese, most recently

dev,rep.gov.BACKBRIEF.JRB

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