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certain honourable Members did not see fit to suggest a further slowing down of the rate of growth of expenditure, but to express hopes that other financial resources could be found. Nor did they hesitate to advocate, in the most general terms, a variety of controls on the economy in response to certain difficulties we are facing at the moment. Yet our economy is just not susceptible to macro-economic management and attempts to control costs, prices and aggregate demand would run the danger of upsetting what my honourable Friend Mr. Sayer has described as our "finely balanced"economy and damaging the flexibility of the market mechanism. Furthermore, once a government has introduced regulatory controls, it is extremely difficult to withdraw them when they have served their purpose and equally difficult to do so if they have failed in their purpose. So in the sphere of economic policy the acid test of good government in certain circumstances is a willingness to run the gamut of short term criticism and decide not to do something. All in all, I find it rather strange that there should be this concern that I am wrongly prescribing for the Hong Kong economy considering that I earned many rebukes in this Chamber, and outside it, in 1973 for being a doctrinaire exponent of so-called "laissez faire". The fact is that
the right economic and fiscal policies for Hong Kong are almost entirely dictated by our circumstances and we should face up to that
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and be thankful too.
This is not to deny that, sixthly, there is an interplay between economic growth and social development. As my honourable Friend Mr. Q. W. Lee put it: "economic development in the next ten years will not be possible without social development"; and he also clearly implied that the converse equally applies. And, as my honourable Friend
Mrs. Symons said so perceptively "the will" (and I personally would add also the ability) "the will to be ready financially must be there in letter and spirit".
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But, seventhly, given the complexities of the world we presently live in, economic growth requires a growing degree of involvement by the Government in the affairs of
/the.....