YOUR Letters to the Editor page has always been a useful forum for the free expression of opinion and I must praise the even-handedness of your letters editors who have accepted 75 out of 77 of mine since 1978 and usually improved them by judicious editing. The forum has become even more important since Mr Patten widened the debate on Hongkong's future by inviting the general public to comment on his tentative proposals for political reform announced on October 7. The quality and variety of opinions expressed here so far should put paid to the misconception that the people of Hongkong are politically apathetic or too timid to speak out. However, it is sometimes painfully obvious that some of those strongly opposed to Mr Patten's constitutional package are unaware of the causes of the present Sino-British deadlock, have not read the two key constitutional documents and do not understand how the Hongkong Government works. It would help them to make a more meaningful contribution to the debate if they were to read the 5th, and latest edition of Dr Norman Miners' The Government and Politics of Hongkong, Professor Ian Scott's, Political Change and the Crisis of Legitimacy inHongkong and dip into the political chapters in the Chinese University's reprint of The Other Hongkong Reports. Without this essential reading newcomers to Hongkong, not to mention some of its more conservative old hands, are likely to view Hongkong's present political scenario as a theatre of the absurd rather than a prep school for local leaders that has been opened a bit too late in the day to turn them out in a nice orderly way. Dr Miners' important book, in particular, is essential reading for those who still cling to the notion that because the territory always seemed to overcome daunting problems in the past it will also take the hurdle of 1997 in its stride - but only if that man Patten will stop messing it around. A lengthy review of the book that is to appear in the upcoming issue of the Asia Pacific Law Review, published by the City Polytechnic of Hongkong, has this to say on the pessimistic tone of Dr Miners' concluding chapter: ''The pessimism is rooted in the assumption that, with the transfer of sovereignty from Britain to China, the high degree of autonomy conceded by London to Governors of Hongkong will lapse. This autonomy is held by many to be one of the main determinantsof Hongkong's spectacular economic progress and advancement in many other fields since World War II. ''The worry is that without such autonomy public policy will no longer be directed principally towards the interests of the people of the territory, but will be determined either by the Peking Government, or by lobbies representing mainland interests based in Hongkong and, furthermore, that those who might seek to question the actions of the executive authorities will quickly be silenced by one means or another.'' Mr Patten's constitutional package cannot ensure the continuation of Hongkong's autonomy. But it can help the future Legislature to check that the executive acts in the interests of Hongkong; as such it should be supported rather than opposed even by those who put the maintenance of Hongkong's prosperity above all else. JOHN WALDEN Pokfulam
