Question No. 13
Reply by Mr G.A. Higginson, Secretary for Economic Services,
to a question by the Hon Peter Poon, MBE, JP in Legislative Council on 29 May 1985
Question:
Reply :
Will the Government make a statement on its policy regarding commercial helicopter services and what plans it has, if any, to encourage such services?
Sir,
Government's long standing policy is to
facilitate, as opposed positively to encourage, the
development of commercial helicopter services based in
Hong Kong. The Civil Aviation Department provides a degree of encouragement by the offer of professional guidance and technical support to prospective operators.
During recent years, however, there have been only a
handful of enquiries. This is presumably because in
commercial terms helicopter operations are finely balanced
ventures. Furthermore, the demand for domestic and
international helicopter services for passenger services
appears to be small, because such operations must compete
with established efficient, convenient and much cheaper
methods of transport.
2.
As a result of the high costs involved in the
provision of the necessary physical infrastructure to facilitate commercial helicopter services, and in view of
the limited demand demonstrated thus far, no direct
investment of public funds for the provision of facilities
for commercial helicopter services is justified at the present time.
However, during the past year, four sites
in the New Territories have been identified as being suitable for development by commercial operators as bases
for domestic or international services should there be a
demand for such services.