Mr Fung Siu-ming
Staff Side Chairman
PS/Lord Caithness
I submit a draft reply
Rodino Candila
R M Marsden, HKD
Model Scale 1 Staff Consultative Council
Room 137 CGO East Wing
Lower Albert Road
Hong Kong
1. Ime
2. Ank you.
t
Lord Caithness has asked me to thank you for your
letter of 20 September about various issues of concern to
your members. Lord Caithness was glad to have had the opportunity to meet you and other representatives of the Model Scale I Staff Consultative Council during his visit to
Hong Kong and to hear your views at first hand.
You express concern about security of pensions. The payment of pensions is now a statutory charge on general revenue. As you point out, the Joint Declaration (which is a binding international agreement) also contains very clear assurances about the continued payment of pensions after 1997. These provisions are fully reflected in the Basic
Law. There is no reason to believe that this undertaking
will not be honoured by the future Hong Kong SAR Government.
Pension payments represent only a very small percentage of
annual recurrent expenditure and the Hong Kong Government
has every confidence that all future pensions payments can
be met.
Nevertheless, I know that the Hong Kong Government are
considering whether any further measures can be taken to
MATAAJ/1