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HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 1st October 1971.
[MR PRESIDENT]
Whilst our society has undoubtedly advanced in many ways, then, it is sad to have to refer so early in this address to one respect in which we have gone backwards. This is in the disturbing and con- tinuously rising incidence of robberies and crimes committed against the person. During the first eight months of this year nearly 4,100 crimes involving violence have been reported. We are not, of course, the only sufferers, or indeed by any means the worst sufferers, from this phenomenon of the growth of violence; other urban areas are suffer- ing as badly or worse; but it is a most disturbing state of affairs when we were previously so law abiding and when so much has been attempted to hold the increase in check.
In recent years we have made substantial progress towards spreading our courts throughout the Colony, and many new magistracies have been opened. We have a penal system as forward looking as exists almost anywhere else. Detection rates remain very high, and Police action to try to curb the offenders is energetic and efficient-but still the violence continues. This is not a suitable occasion on which to go into the problem at length, but I do most earnestly believe that we and others must make a fresh enquiry not only into appropriate additional counter- measures but also into basic causes: since I do not believe that we have identified these causes with any certainty at all.
But, apart from this quite recent and serious blot on our record, other forms of lawlessness have on the whole been well con- tained. I have special hopes of the new anti-bribery legislation which will, I trust, with public co-operation, help to reduce corruption. And may I repeat here that this is a tough measure reflecting a tough attitude to this evil. There can be no room for tolerance for, far less sympathy with, persons who for whatever reasons resort to corrupt ways whether as the giver or the receiver of bribes.
I would like to turn now to the state of our economy, on which of course wholly depends our ability to raise standards of living and improve community and social services. For fifteen years continuously we have experienced a high rate of economic growth, probably of the order of an average nine or ten per cent annually. In the ten years from 1961 to 1970, public revenue has grown by an average of 11 per cent annually, and this with only one significant rise in rates of taxation. Over the same period electricity consumption rose by an average of 13 per cent annually and bank deposits by 16 per cent. Our total external trade increased each year by about 10 per cent from 1961 to 1967; and by as much as an average of 20 per cent annually from 1968 to 1970. At the last count Hong Kong ranked 18th among the trading nations of the world. Domestic exports have grown since 1961 at the high average
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