asked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on British relations with Brunei.

His Highness the Sultan has recently visited London for talks with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and myself. Heads of proposals about the form which relations between Britain and Brunei should take were discussed and initialled by the Sultan and by me. The substance of the Heads of Proposals will now be put into the form of a draft agreement amending the 1959 Agreement. This will be discussed at a further meeting in the first half of next year. It was agreed that a battalion of the British Brigade of Gurkhas should remain in Brunei on the present basis for the time being.