---

East Asia

Excellent. The Minister always makes a fearful dragon, as I am sure those in the parliamentary Labour party remember from his days as party chairman. I repeat that 2007 is notable because it is 10 years since Hong Kong returned to China. I cannot resist observing that when history comes to be written, the success of the negotiations on Hong Kong will be recorded as one of the lasting achievements of Margaret Thatcher’s Government and as the personal achievement of, and a tribute to, the painstaking patience of Geoffrey Howe as Foreign Secretary. The idea of ““one country, two systems”” was embodied in the first Sino-British joint declaration of 1984, and later in the Chinese Government’s ““basic law””, which now forms the constitution of Hong Kong. What was remarkable about the settlement secured with China was the fact that the idea of two systems was allowed to be so far-reaching. As it is put in the joint declaration, Hong Kong enjoys a"““high degree of autonomy, except in Foreign and Defence Affairs””." In reality, the joint declaration and the ““basic law”” give Hong Kong phenomenal autonomy. Moreover, there is common consent that the provisions of the joint declaration and the ““basic law”” have been followed almost comprehensively in substance and in spirit since 1997. The consequence has been that for Hong Kong it has always been very much business as usual, but with the extra bonus, particularly for the United Kingdom, of the opportunities created by the opening up of the Chinese economy. Hong Kong offers huge opportunities for UK business, both in Hong Kong itself and in the wider region—