ENG-1967 — Page 219

IMMIGRATION AND TOURISM

161

in attacks on the immigration post. There were no casualties and little damage, but it was decided to evacuate the control point and carry out immigration control from a position further back. A number of immigration officers at Lo Wu were commended by the Governor for their devotion to duty during this period.

The uneasy political situation in Macau affected traffic to and from Hong Kong. There was a heavy influx of refugees from Macau at the beginning of the year, but generally there was a considerable reduction in passenger traffic. Traffic to Macau for the Grand Prix motor race in November was down some 28 per cent compared with the previous year.

There are now four steamers and 11-hydrofoils (the largest hydrofoil fleet in the Commonwealth) employed on the Macau run, and these craft during the year took 979,256 passengers to Macau and brought 1,002,107 into Hong Kong. This represented a decrease in traffic of 27.05 per cent on the 1966 figures. It was unfortunate that this reduction coincided with the completion of extensions to both ferry and hydrofoil terminals in Hong Kong. It was decided at the end of the year to centralize all traffic controls in the main terminal building. During the year the harbour section cleared 6,518 ocean-going ships, 14,950 native craft, and 20,562 Macau ferry and hydrofoils, and handled a total of 1,027,519 arriving and 1,007,196 departing sea passengers. On December 1, immigration clearance of outward bound ocean-going shipping was instituted for the first time, on a spot-check basis.

Passenger traffic at Kai Tak Airport fluctuated a good deal. During the year 1,243,818 passengers and 30,926 aircraft were dealt with an increase of 9.91 per cent on the previous year.

The experiment, introduced in 1965, of employing women immi- gration officers at the airport has proved highly successful and more women officers are now working in every section of the department. During the year language courses in French and Japanese were conducted for selected members of the service to improve their efficiency in dealing with travellers.

Further relaxations in Hong Kong's already liberal immigration requirements were brought into operation on August 14, rather appropriately for International Tourist Year. Nationals of Andorra,