side, with the aim of ensuring as much continuity as
possible. If the Council is to run its full 4-year term through 1997 to 1999, it will need to be consistent with the
Basic Law. Mr Patten will be setting out the broad lines
of our proposals for the 1995 elections in his inaugural
address to LegCo on 7 October.
Political Parties
13.
Indigenous political parties are relatively recent to
Hong Kong; they came into being in order to contest the first direct elections to the Legislative Council (LegCo) in September 1991. Before that, political groups operated informally at local level or to lobby on specific issues.
14.
The largest, and most successful party is the United
Democrats of Hong Kong (UDHK), the so-called liberals. They
won 45% of the vote and 12 of the 18 directly-elected seats,
with 4 of the rest going to other "liberal" candidates.
Business interests were represented by the Liberal
Democratic Federation (LDF), which won 5% of the vote and no
seats. Pro-China groups won just under 8% of the vote and
no seats. The remaining 2 seats (17.5% of the vote) went to independent candidates.
15.
After the 1991 elections business interests in LegCo
represented by appointed and functional constituency
members, formed a group called the Co-operative Resources
Centre (CRC), led by Mr Allen Lee. The CRC intends to turn itself into a political party shortly in order to prepare
for the 1995 LegCo elections.
16.
Other political parties include the pro-Peking Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB),
formed in May 1992; the smaller liberal parties: Meeting
Point and Association for Democracy and Peoples' Livelihood
(ADPL), which have 3 LegCo seats between them; and the Hong
Kong Democratic Foundation (HKDF), which also favours more
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