Murray MacLehose, Baron MacLehose of Beoch

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Crawford Murray MacLehose, Baron MacLehose of Beoch ( Chinese  麥 理 浩  /  麦 理 浩 ; born October 16, 1917 in Glasgow ; † May 27, 2000 in Ayrshire , Scotland ) was a British politician and diplomat. From 1971 to 1982 he was the 25th governor of what was then the British crown colony of Hong Kong and, with four consecutive terms of office, also the longest-serving governor.

Early life and early career

Murray MacLehose was the second child of Hamish Alexander MacLehose and Margaret Bruce Black. He attended the 1931 Rugby School and then the Balliol College of Oxford University .

During World War II , MacLehose used his position as British Vice Consul to covertly train Chinese partisans to carry out acts of sabotage behind the Japanese lines.

In the late 1960s, MacLehose was the principal private secretary of British Foreign Secretary George Brown .

MacLehose's career was in jeopardy when he forgot a copy of a confidential telegram in a bank in 1967. This letter from British Prime Minister Harold Wilson to American President Lyndon B. Johnson and concerning the Vietnam War was found by another British diplomat and brought back. Wilson and Brown prevented an investigation into this security breach because they valued MacLehose's skills, thus saving his career. In the same year 1967 MacLehose was appointed British Ambassador to South Vietnam .

Before being appointed governor of Hong Kong in 1971, MacLehose served in the British embassy in Beijing and as the British ambassador to Denmark.

Hong Kong Governor

MacLehose became governor of Hong Kong in November 1971 and remained in this capacity until May 1982, making him Hong Kong's longest-serving governor; wearing this post for 10 years and 6 months is one month higher than Sir Alexander Grantham's previous record . He was often affectionately called "Jock the Sock", alluding to his Scottish descent ("Jock" is a colloquial English expression for "Schotte") and his name ("hose" is an old name for English "sock", in German) "Sock"). He rarely wore his official uniform because it made him uncomfortable.

As a Labor Party- influenced diplomat, MacLehose carried out a variety of reforms during his tenure that laid the foundation for the self-confidence of the people of modern Hong Kong. He had Chinese recognized as the official language of communication alongside English. He also greatly expanded welfare and initiated an extensive public housing program. To fight corruption he founded the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) in 1974 . By creating the District Boards (local councils for Hong Kong's districts), he greatly improved the accountability of the government. He oversaw the construction of the Mass Transit Railway , the Hong Kong subway system, and other major infrastructure projects. Under his observation, municipal and art institutions were expanded and public campaigns, for example against garbage and violent crimes, were launched.

The increased spending on these reforms required approval from the UK Treasury , and the Hong Kong government's increase in spending by over 50 percent in the first two years of MacLehose's tenure met with considerable opposition.

Other significant government actions

Other important government decisions made during MacLehose's tenure include:

  • The introduction of nine years of compulsory education.
  • A ten-year housing program was introduced in 1972 to alleviate the housing shortage.
  • The establishment of new satellite cities such as Sha Tin and Tuen Mun .
  • The establishment of landscape parks.
  • The introduction and approval of a labor law regulation.
  • The establishment of a social welfare program.
  • The construction of the Mass Transit Railway .
  • The expansion of communal facilities.
  • The introduction of Chinese as an official language.
  • The introduction of paid vacations.
  • Increasing the range of social services for seniors.
  • The introduction of allowances for the disabled.
  • The introduction of severance pay for employees.
  • The idea of ​​a home ownership plan to encourage home ownership.
  • The introduction of a large rehabilitation program for the disabled and socially disadvantaged.
  • The increase in the number of schools and hospitals.
  • The introduction of compensation for law enforcement violations.
  • The introduction of support for victims of road accidents.
  • The introduction of allowances for special needs of the elderly.
  • The introduction of sickness grants for eligible and low paid employees.
  • The introduction of weekly rest days.
  • The introduction of labor courts.
  • The introduction of the Junior Secondary Education Assessment (JSEA) system to increase the number of subsidized places in upper secondary education.
  • The establishment of the Geotechnical Engineering Office (part of the Civil Engineering and Development Department ) to ensure the safety of mountain slopes in order to avoid further loss of life such as that caused by the Sau Mau Ping landslides in 1972 and 1976.

Negotiations to return Hong Kong to China

1979 MacLehose entered into talks with China's de facto leader Deng Xiaoping regarding the British 99-year lease of the New Territories (an area comprising all the territories north of Boundary Street on the Kowloon Peninsula). Although the negotiations were unsuccessful at the time, top officials of the British government were involved in them and paved the way for the surrender of all of Hong Kong (including the parts that were then "forever" ceded to Great Britain) to the People's Republic of China on July 1, 1997.

Later life and death

After the end of his tenure as governor of Hong Kong, which expired in 1982, MacLehose was raised to life peer on May 21 of the same year with the title Baron MacLehose of Beoch , of Maybole in the District of Kyle and Carrick and of Victoria in Hong Kong and thereby became a member of the House of Lords . In 1983 he was made a Knight of the Thistle Order. In 1992 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Hong Kong. In 1997, at the age of 80, he attended the handover ceremony in Hong Kong.

MacLehose died on May 27, 2000 at the age of 82 in Ayrshire, Scotland.

Honors

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A&C Black: MacLEHOSE OF BEOCH, Baron . In: Who Was Who, online edition . Oxford University Press. 2000. Retrieved May 2, 2012.
  2. ↑ Simon Winchester: The Man Who Loved China , 2008, p. 150.
  3. ↑ Peter Graff, Mislaid MacLehose cable reveals UK efforts to end Vietnam War ( Memento of the original from June 4, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , The Standard , November 2, 2007 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.thestandard.com.hk
  4. ^ Roger Goodman, Gordon White and Huck-ju Kwon: The East Asian welfare model: welfare Orientalism and the state .
  5. ^ District Administration Hong Kong Government
  6. ↑ Liam Fitzpatrick: Sir Murray MacLehose . In: 60 Years of Asian Heroes , Time, November 13, 2006. Retrieved March 21, 2012. 
  7. ↑ Linda Wong, Lynn T. White and Shixun Gui: Social policy reform in Hong Kong and Shanghai: a tale of two cities .
  8. ↑ Betty Yung: Hong Kong's housing policy: a case study in social justice
  9. ^ John Mark Carroll: A concise history of Hong Kong . Rowman & Littlefield , 2007, ISBN 978-0-7425-3422-3 .
  10. ↑ Ibid
  11. ^ Pattie Walsh: Hong Kong employment law: a practical guide
  12. ^ A b Idit Weiss and John Dixon: Professional ideologies and preferences in social work: a global study
  13. ↑ Beth Reiber: Frommer's Hong Kong
  14. ^ University of Hong Kong: Growing with Hong Kong: the University and its graduates: the first 90 years
  15. ↑ Amy Tsui and James W. Tollefson: Language policy, culture, and identity in Asian contexts
  16. ↑ a b Ming Sing: Hong Kong's tortuous democratization: a comparative analysis
  17. ^ Wai-man Lam: Understanding the Political Culture of Hong Kong: The Paradox of Activism and Depolitization
  18. ↑ John Dodsworth and Dubravko Mihaljek: Hong Kong, China: growth, structural change, and economic stability during the transition
  19. ↑ Harry Fang Sinyang and Lawrence Jeffery: Rehabilitation: A Life's Work
  20. ^ Wai-Man Lam: Understanding the political culture of Hong Kong: the paradox of activism and depoliticization
  21. ^ Catherine M. Jones: Promoting prosperity: the Hong Kong way of social policy
  22. ↑ Ibid
  23. ↑ Ibid
  24. ↑ Ibid
  25. ↑ Ibid
  26. ↑ Ibid
  27. ↑ Ibid
  28. ^ Computer Animation of the 1972 & 76 Sau Mau Ping Landslides on YouTube
  29. ↑ a b London Gazette . No. 48992, HMSO, London, May 26, 1982, p. 6989 ( PDF , English).
  30. ^ University of Hong Kong, Honorary Degrees Congregation
  31. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 37407, HMSO, London, January 1, 1946, p. 16 ( PDF , English).
  32. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 43200, HMSO, London, January 1, 1964, p. 5 ( PDF , English).
  33. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 45384, HMSO, London, June 12, 1971, p. 5959 ( PDF , English).
  34. ↑ London Gazette . No. 46610, HMSO, London, June 19, 1975, p. 7843 ( PDF , English).
  35. ^ London Gazette  (Supplement). No. 46919, HMSO, London, June 12, 1976, p. 8031 ​​( PDF , English).
  36. ↑ London Gazette . No. 49557, HMSO, London, December 2, 1983, p. 15977 ( PDF , English).
personal data
SURNAME MacLehose, Murray, Baron MacLehose of Beoch
ALTERNATIVE NAMES MacLehose, Crawford Murray, Baron MacLehose of Beoch (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British politician and diplomat
DATE OF BIRTH October 16, 1917
PLACE OF BIRTH Glasgow
DATE OF DEATH May 27, 2000
Place of death Ayrshire (Scotland)