Page 315
Cotton Textiles.
when the Chinese temporarily relaxed their exit controls.
Recent
operations to remove them to approved areas have been the subject of
representations to M.Ps, some of whom (including r Bottomley) wrote to
Lord Lansdowne. A copy of Lord Lansdowne's reply is attached.
9. More than a million Chinese immigrants have entered the Colony
since the war. More than half a million have been rehoused in
resettlement and low-cost housing estates paid for by the Hong Kong
Government, whose current plans provide for housing 100,000 people a
year. About half a million squatters remain to be resettled in housing
estates.
10.
(Mr Bottomley has not mentioned this.) Talks are in progress
between representatives of the Hong Kong Cotton Advisory Board and the
United Kingdom Cotton Board (at the latter's request) about the
categorisation of Hong Kong exports of cotton textiles to the United
Kingdon within the overall limits on such exports under the "Lancashire
Agreement." (For the Secretary of State's information only. There is
strong feeling about this in Hong Kong, where the Cotton Board's
initiative is regarded as a unilateral attempt by Lancashire to change
the terms of the Agreement during its currency.)
11.
It would be best to avoid any discussion of the issues while
these talks are proceeding.
Defence, Intelligence and Hong Kong Dopartment,
COLONIAL OFFICE.
14th November, 1963
Page 315
Page 315
October 3, 1963
e 316 of 344
HO
T
24HL
Page 316,pf34
11 35
Representing Hongkong
THE RECENT VISITS to Hongkong by two senior representatives of the two major Parties at Westminster has re- vived the public debate on constitutional reform for the Colony. The Review has always agreed with the point made by Mr Healey: that a representative Gov- ernment with power would be unduly dominated by "external influences”.
The problem is thus one of the evolu- tion of a more efficient form of repre- sentation of the Colony's case at White- hall. An article below throws some doubt on the efficacy of the present links between the Hongkong authorities and the Colonial Office. It is widely felt, and with some reason, that some ma- chinery should exist-separate from the Colonial administration-to put Hong- kong's case to the legislators at West- minster. What is needed now is not so much increased representation as im- proved communication.
The Civic Association has recommend- ed that the House of Commons establish a bi-partisan Parliamentary Sub-Com- mittce to watch over Hongkong affairs.
Failing that, both political Parties should set up such sub-committees. These sug- gestions seem to be admirable first steps in the right direction.
The remark by Lord Lansdowne that the present administration meets the needs of the Colony very well and that only minor mechanical adjustments were necessary is plainly nonsense. If that
were
so there would be no housing problem, no widespread poverty, no acute shortage of education-in short no major problems.
On the other hand, Mr Healey's suggestion that Hongkong may very well be represented at some stage by an MP at Westminster may seem શ little premature. Although the sugges- tion that Malta should have such re- presentation was widely welcomed in Britain at the time it was made, such a development would necessitate signi- ficant changes at Westminster. And it must be remembered that Malta's popu- lation was franchised. There are, after all, some intermediate stages. Puerto Rico, for example, sends observers (who
have no vote) to the U.S. Congress. These observers have full access to Con- gressmen to plead their country's case.
But the question which immedi- ately rises is: how is Hongkong to choose its representative? Two things seem clear: he should be elected and he should preferably be Chinese.
At present the restricted electorate entitled to vote for candidates for the Urban Council is the only group in Hongkong who can claim any sort of representation. If steps were taken to enlarge this electorate and to make elect-
ed members of the Urban Council eligible for appointment (or election by their colleagues) to seats on the Legis lative Council, Hongkong would have made some start along the road of con- stitutional progress.
Mr Healey was right to draw atten- tion to the fact that the Legislative Council is appointed from a very nar- row section of the community (a fact reflected in their "debates"). If the Council could be widened and made more responsive to the community's needs, Hongkong would be appreciably nearer the day when it could send its representative to the Mother of Parlia-
ments.
The recent visits to Hongkong by Lord Lansdowne, Minister of State for Colonial Affairs, and Mr Denis Healey, the Labour Party's spokesman on Defence, have caused comment and controversy on the issues they raised. Mr Davies today comments on the visits and the local reaction to them.
Birds of Passage
By Derek Davies
IT TAKES perhaps the supreme conceit of a politician to visit a complicated economic and social community of three- and-a-half million people for three days and at the end of that time to call a conference to inform the local press of one's reactions and conclusions. Recently Hongkong has been treated Page 31f34fcctacle of two such visitors from
opposite sides of the British Parliament. It cannot be said that either left a good impression or gave the Colony any cause for hope that its case would be more competently argued. - in British political circles than it has been in the past.
Of the visit of Lord Lansdowne, Minister of State for Colonial Affairs, it would be perhages 3 & Ukw 34screet
UMW
36
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