CONFIDENTIAL
(a) Hong Kong Government have to clear the backlog of
people waiting to be screened thus reducing the length of
detention pre-screening and the scope for challenge on this
ground;
(b) there is a possibility (no more) that within a year
a mandatory repatriation scheme might be in place, thus
reducing the length of detention post-screening and making release on bail pending repatriation more palatable.
Either eventuality would enable Hong Kong Government to cope
better with challenges that might arise after the lifting of
the freeze period.
Resources
8. At present, Hong Kong Government employ over 300 full time staff on the VBP problem at a cost of £5 million a
year. This excludes interpreters who are employed on temporary terms. The waiting-list for screening is about
two years.
The screening process itself takes 6-8 weeks. Following a recent judgment on screening, Hong Kong need to introduce reading-back of interviews. This will increase interview time by about 50%. Merely in order to keep the waiting period down to two years, Hong Kong Government will need more immigration staff whom they hope to find through redeployment. To reduce the waiting period would require additional staff, who would need training, and therefore extra funds. In the absence of a mandatory repatriation scheme, Hong Kong Government see little chance of LegCo approving this. More interpreters would also be needed: there is already a shortage of qualified personnel.
9.
Hong Kong Government has spent some HK$3.5 billion (£250 million) on the overall care of VBP between 1979/80 and 1990/91. The cost of the screening process was estimated at HK$75 million (£5.3 million) in 1990/91.
TOMBAZ/4
CONFIDENTIAL