Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 5 July 2017 to Question 2349, whether he or the Minister for Asia plan to seek a meeting with Lord Patten of Barnes to discuss (a) human rights and the state of democracy in Hong Kong and (b) the Joint British-Sino Declaration.

I have no immediate plans to meet Rt Hon. Lord Patten of Barnes, and he has not requested a meeting.

I held a meeting with the Chinese Ambassador on 5 July in which I made clear that the British Government did not accept the position of the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson that the Joint Declaration was an historical document of no practical significance. I stressed that on this basis, as a guarantor of the Joint Declaration, and the principle of 'one country,one system', the British Government regarded it as legitimate to continue to issue a six-monthly report to Parliament on Hong Kong affairs.