Letter: Court of Appeal in Hong Kong

From Mr R. J. F. Hoare

Sir: Your report from Hong Kong on 23 June ("Patten shrugs off motion of no confidence") repeats the mistake perpetuated in your previous article of 10 June ("London 'kowtows' on Hong Kong court") on the recently concluded Court of Final Appeal (CFA) agreement. You state that the agreement "takes away the court's powers to rule on 'acts of state' ". This is quite untrue. Nothing in the agreement or the CFA Bill takes away any powers from the court.

The formulation on "acts of state" in the Basic Law will be the law of Hong Kong as from 1 July 1997, regardless of whether or not it is also included in the CFA Bill. And it will be for the courts of the SAR (Special Administrative Region of China) to interpret this formulation, save in exceptional cases which involve an interpretation of a provision of the Basic Law that relates to the powers of the central government, or the relationship between the central authorities and the region.

Both articles also failed to report that the CFA agreement provides for the establishment of a proper Court of Final Appeal that, subject only to the Basic Law, will have the same functions and jurisdiction as the judicial committee of the Privy Council does now in respect of Hong Kong; and that the agreement enables the court to be established on the basis of a Bill passed before the end of July, which means that now - two years before it is set up on 1 July, 1997 - there will be certainty about its nature and jurisdiction.

Both articles also quoted Martin Lee as attacking the agreement. But they failed to report the fact that it has been warmly welcomed by the Chief Justice of Hong Kong, by the local and international business community, by Hong Kong's major trading partners - including the US, the EU, Australia, Canada and Japan - and, according to independent opinion polls, by the people of Hong Kong as well.

Yours sincerely,

Richard Hoare

Director of Administration

Government Secretariat

Hong Kong

27 June