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If
Before I leave the subject of reactions to the Green Paper, I must confess my utter amazement that there are insufficient copies of this important paper for distribution. reports in the media are accurate, and I have no reason to doubt that they are not, why are there only 200,000 copies printed in a
I community where the adult population numbers over 2 million? understand a reprint is urgently under way, but the Administration's gross underestimation in this respect is a matter for regret, given that the public has only 2 months to comment on the proposals.
In his annual address to this Council in the autumn of 1971, the then Governor, Sir David Trench, said -
.....
.. has, as a
'A constitution (such as Hong Kong's) matter of plain commonsense, to be as sensitive as possible to the state of public opinion.'
And in January 1974, the Chief Secretary Sir Philip Haddon-Cave in his then capacity as Financial Secretary in a speech to the Hong Kong University Economics Society said
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Essentially, the Hong Kong style is Government by
consultation and consent.
These 2 statements taken together sum up our present system of Government by consultation and consensus.
The Government, in devising and formulating its policies, seek advice from its two major Councils, over 300 boards and committees and 18 District Boards, in addition to the constant and careful monitoring of public opinion. Measured by western standards, we cannot claim to have a fully representative Government, but we do live in a relatively stable and progressive society, enjoying the various essential freedoms we all dearly cherish. The virtue of our existing system of Government is the