XCC(71)17
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The Committee, however, feels that this would impose too heavy a strain on the limited number of interpreters and translators available locally and would result in undesirable delay. It recom- mends, therefore, that Government should first gain experience in simultaneous interpretation and then, at a later stage, review the position from time to time.
5
In relation to Government Boards and Committees, the Committee recommends a similar two-stage approach namely with:
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(a)
(b)
Stage 1, in which immediate action should be taken to provide simultaneous interpretation facilities and to improve translation facilities for those Boards and Committees which already have non-English speaking members; and
Stage II, in which interpretation and translation facilities are extended to enable more non-English speaking members to serve on Boards and Com- mittees. The Committee feels that problems similar to those involved in the Stage II proposals for the Legislative and Urban Councils must for the time being limit the extension of such facil- ities. However, it believes that, if priority is to be awarded between the two, extendon of facilities to Boards and Committees should command the higher priority.
Paragraphs 27 to 37 of the Report deals with the manpower and equipment that will be required to implement Phase I of the Committee's recommendations. These paragraphs lay emphasis on the need to recruit and train a "core" of (two or three) simultaneous interpreters together with a pool of freelances as recommended by Mr A. T. Pilley, and that the remun- eration of such interpreters should reflect the qualifications and responsibil- ities of their work. On the question of equipment for simultaneous inter- pretation the Committee recommends that only the Legislative Council Chambers need be so equipped since the Urban Council could well conduct its monthly public meetings there rather than in the Urban Council Chamber, (though this recommendation, it is later suggested, should not be accepted), For use in Government Boards and Committees, the Report recommends that only one set of portable equipment be purchased. The estimated costs of these recommendations are set out in paragraph 39 of the Report. From this, Honourable Members will note that the estimated capital expenditure is $131,000 and the estimated annual recurrent expenditure is $156,000.
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Although, in principle, it is clearly desirable that non- English speaking members of the public should be able to follow open proceedings of the Legislative and Urban Councils, it has not hitherto been possible to devise an adequate system of simultaneous interpretation from English into Cantonese which is, of course, the fundamental pre- requisite to bilingualism in the two Councils. This question was in fact