UMELCO
DRAFT SPEECH BY HON HILTON CHEONG-LEEN, CBE, JP LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 28.5.1986
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Banking Bill 1986
Sir,
I support the Banking Bill 1986 together with the amendments now proposed both by the official side and by the LegCo
Ad Hoc Group.
Not being a banker, I shall confine my remarks to a few
non-technical observations.
In recent years, liberalization in the banking industry
has encouraged the establishment here of more banks and
deposit-taking companies per square mile than in most other
industrialized cities in the world. This has led to more
competition, more risk-taking, smaller profit margins and a range of abuses in the industry.
The liberalization did indeed cause a number of serious
problems in the banking industry to surface, and in the interest of preserving what is generally still accepted as Hong Kong's
stable financial climate, the Government considered it wise to
come to the rescue of several banks, and to use the Exchange Fund
as the financial guarantor of its actions.
In recent months, I have had occasion to speak to
concerned people in the banking and investment fields in different parts of the world, and there was much praise for the Financial Secretary and the Banking Commissioner for their decisive actions. Against the delicate background of the Sino-British Negotiations leading up to the signing of the Joint Declaration and thinking ahead of the prospects of 1997 and beyond, it is not
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