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1775
Hong Kong
18 DECEMBER 1974
[Sir P. Bryan.] China, raw materials-textile fibres and plastics-largely from Japan. Hong Kong's processing industries Use machinery imported from all over the world, and 80 per cent, of their finished products-predominantly textiles and clothing, electrical goods and plastic pro- ducts are exported mainly to the United States and the EEC.
This dependence on foreign trade leads inevitably to certain clear-cut economic policies. Due also to its origin as a trade entrepôt for China, Hong Kong believes in the virtues of free enterprise and free trade: low import duties, low taxation, unrestricted capital movements and equal treatment of locally based and foreign operations.
Firm and constant adherence to these policies has led to one of the most re- markable phenomena in history--the sevenfold growth in 25 years, on a tiny, Inhospitable patch of this world, of a community from 600,000 to 4-2 million people. Let me emphasise, 100, that the bulk of these 4 million people came to Hong Kong, often in the face of great hardship, of their own free will, and they remain there of their own free will.
Critics may say that these policies of low taxation and free enterprise have made the rich too rich. What they cer- tainly have done is to attract investment from all over the world, resulting in highly elficient industry which alone can give good employment and a good living to this growing population. So these policies are the very reason for the existence of Hong Kong and its community, 'The prosperity that they have brought has been the main cause of the growth of the community.
This mushroom growth has in turn been the cause of huge social problems and it is to these that I should like to address my speech tonight.
I quote the Governor's speech to the Legislative Council on 16th October this year:
"In the last quarter century, life in Hong Kong has been dominated by the way in which the growth in population outstripped the capacity of any government to provide for residents and immigrants like some of the basic infrastructure of life. But the problem was faced and very great progress was made. So much so that two years ago your Government · concluded that the time
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I pay particular tribute to the approach of Sir Murray Maciehose, the governor, and his team to these social problems. Anyone who thinks of Hong Kong as a purely materialistic, get-rich, society and nothing else should read the governor's mammoth State of the Nation" speech. Three-quarters of this speech is devoted to the plans for the social betterment of those who live their lives in the colony.
By now these long-term plans for hous- ing, social welfare, education, medical and health services, are well under way. I shall be specially interested to see some- thing of them during my visit.
Housing has been one of the biggest problems and biggest achievements in Hong Kong. What has been done is unique in the Far East, but the problems remain formidable. The plans of the new housing authority look like trans- forming the situation within the next 10 years. I should like to know from the Minister whether these plans are affected by the current downturn in trade, which Hong Kong shares with the rest of the world.
The education services have not been able to keep up with the needs of the rocketing population. The new White Paper gives real hope that this will be remedied. I find the plans for technical education, and polytechnic and industrial training particularly encouraging and necessary, especially in a society that can prosper only by consistently maintaining à technical lead in industry.
To the outsider, one of the less credit- able sides of the Hong Kong scene would seem to be its crime and corruption record. This problem is being tackled with a will. There has been a real break- through in recruitment for the police. Police techniques and training have been improved. The idea of mobilising people in neighbourhoods to help each other and the police to deter crime seems full of promise and, if successful, might well be copied in other countries.
Crime figures nevertheless are still rising. I must warn the Minister of State that when his colleague visits Hong Kong he will meet a very strong pressure to
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