CREEN PAPER
A PATTERN OF DISTRICT ADMINISTRATION IN HONG KONG
CHAPTER I
Introduction
1. Many types of local organization have evolved both in the urban area and in the New Territories. These have provided local focus, stimulus, support and criticism, with substantial benefit for local administration and for community development. The pattern is complex and contains both official and unofficial bodies of which some have executive and some advisory functions. Of the unofficial bodies some are appointed by the Government, some are elected, some have emerged through the mutual agreement of their members. Additional complexity arises from the different patterns which have evolved in the New Territories and in the urban area, and in the latter there is the special position of the Urban Council. The details are set out in Annex I.
2. The Executive and Legislative Councils, the central organs of Government, have evolved, and will continue to evolve as circumstances require, within the imperatives of stability and dependability which the special circumstances of Hong Kong dictate. In so small and concentrated a community it is important that budgetary policy, the control of public services and of the main programmes of social and economic improvement should not be fragmented, but should continue to be centrally directed. But there is much scope for the inhabitants of individual Districts to have more say over the impact, adequacy and effects of these services and policies, and to have better and more uniform channels for bringing their views to bear on the Government.
3. The activity shown by members of the many bodies referred to above, and the response to the campaigns of recent years, have amply demonstrated the large number of people both old and young, willing and eager to give of their time and experience to advise on the welfare and improve the administration of the District in which they live. The purpose of this paper is to suggest how their ability to do so can be improved, and how the administration can be adjusted to assist this process.
4. As the proposals made in this paper are principally directed to the better co-ordination and responsiveness of administration at District level and to the greater participation of the inhabitants of each District in it, they are relevant to, but not inconsistent with, the role of the Urban Council. The Urban Council has important responsibilities in clearly defined fields of administration in all Districts of the urban area but does not exercise overall administrative control of local affairs in the area. It is not intended in any way to alter the Urban Council's position in this respect since its worth has been fully demonstrated
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