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SCMP Reporter

I REFER to Roger Huntington's letter headlined, ''Government's responsibility'' (South China Morning Post, March 25).

  In Hong Kong, birth certificates are copies of entries in the register books of births kept by the Registrar of Births and Deaths in the general register office and district offices in Hong Kong under the Births and Deaths Registration Ordinance, Cap. 174, Laws of Hong Kong.

  They are public documents and, under the same ordinance, any person is entitled on payment of the prescribed fee, to obtain a copy of any entry in the register books of births.

  Register books of births or individual entries in these books will not be transferred to the UK, because they are public and because it is obligatory for the Registrar of Births and Deaths to issue birth certificates to all persons born in Hong Kong, before or after 1997.

  We are not aware of any international precedent of duplicating birth records of expatriates to their country of origin.

  The Director of Immigration, being the Registrar of Births and Deaths appointed under the Births and Deaths Registration Ordinance, has the responsibility to ensure that such records are properly maintained. This will remain so after 1997.

  We understand that, in a foreign country, a British citizen can register the births of his children in the local birth registry as well as in a British consulate there.

 He can then obtain his children's birth certificates from the local birth registry and the British consulate.

  The records of births registered at a British consulate are transferred to London periodically and subsequent copies of the birth entries are obtainable there.

  As Hong Kong is still a British dependent territory, there is at present no British consulate here and, therefore, no consular birth registration can be effected.

  However, any person can, on the payment of prescribed fees, obtain copies of the birth entries in the register books of births kept by the Registrar of Births and Deaths in Hong Kong both before and after 1997.

  VIVIENNE WONG for Director of Immigration 



No plans to send register of births to UK