CONF.DENTIAL
8.
relations with the public are eroded by corruption, and even more by the widespread ( and traditional Chinese) belief that contact with the Police does not pay.
22.
But
The answer lies in weeding out corruption, educating the public, and achieving a higher calibre of constable. The latter is crucial. To this end, as from November, we greatly increased the pay of the lower levels of the police in relation to the rest of the public service. we have also, in more positive vein, opened a special residential school to remove would-be recruits from the normal environment of the street and resettlement block, for two years before they enter the Force. The school will have an annual output of 600 by 1975/76, (i.e. over half the annual intake of the Force).
Corruption.
23.
After the stock exchange, the second most newsworthy event of the year was Superintendent Godber's escape, and the public outcry about corruption it provoked. Anyone with an axe to grind or a score to pay leapt on this band-wagon. But exaggeration and malice apart, there were good grounds for the outcry, as corruption in the public services in Hong Kong is too widespread to be acceptable to a British Administration.
24.
The outcry and the implications for the credibility of the Government for a time were really disturbing. However fortunately the public and press were assured by the evidently determined way we reacted; the immediate appointment of a Commission of Enquiry: the publication in full of the Commission's reports: the establishment of an independent civilian Commissioner for Anti-Corruption to take over the functions of the Anti-Corruption branch of the police, with wide terms of reference to include education and prevention as well as the detection of corrupt practices; and the arrival of Mr. John Prendergast to lead the Operations section of the new Commission.
CONE DENTAL