12
Servants of Hong Kong and the Senior Non-Expatriate Officers'
Associations)". Of the 100,000 or so public servants in Hong Kong,
these three associations have a total membership below 6500; they
represent, moreover, predominently the upper grades of the Civil Service
(other than the 500 or so members of the top "directorate", which have a
separate standing review committee for pay). There are over 80 trade
unions of public servants (who appear to be at least 30% organised)
several of which claim memberships larger than any of the above three.
So that even the majority of government-employed trade unionists,
including virtually all the manual workers, are excluded from these
consultations. We are aware this is a situation the administration is
now interested to remedy; we cite it only as a major illustration of the
immaturity of normal industrial relations development in Hong Kong.
25. We can perhaps add a final point of illustration here. There is a provision of long standing (the Trade Boards Ordinance of 1940), which
permits legal wage boards analagous to the present British Wages
Councils to be established to order statutory minimum wage-rates in
particular trades where this is thought desirable. The procedure has
never been used, and no representation to apply it has ever been made.
The Labour Relations Ordinance adopted in August 1975 would appear to
make it possible for a union to push disputes to the point at which
either employers were obliged to accept voluntary arbitration or a
public board of inquiry was appointed, but no attempt has so far been
made to use this*.
26. Such official procedures have, of course, in other countries
frequently been exploited by trade unions as instruments to confront,
levers to move, employers who refused to negotiate. The puzzle in
Hong Kong is why, despite its high level of industrialisation, no such
pressure should have developed in its case.
or
*
/III Explanations
There is a separate procedure for a Committee of Enquiry to be set up
in disputes in the civil service, under the 1968 agreement which
established the present negotiating council, but even this has been
resorted to in only one case.