HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
ADDRESS BY CHAIRMAN.
I would like to welcome back Mr. Baron on his return from leave. I feel sure you would also wish me to express our appreciation to Mr. Walton for his services and help to the Council during Mr. Baron's absence.
MINUTES.
The Minutes of the meeting of the Council held on 1st December, 1959 were confirmed.
PAPERS.
THE CHAIRMAN laid upon the table the following paper:
Report on the work of the Urban Council and Urban Services Department for the month of December, 1959.
QUESTIONS.
MR. H. CHEONG-LEEN asked the following question:—
"(a) Will the Chairman state where the next Urban Council Swimming pool will be located?
(b) Will the Chairman be able to give an assurance that the swimming pool will be completed in time for the 1960 swimming season? Will everything possible be done to expedite completion of this swimming pool?”
THE CHAIRMAN replied as follows:
"The next Council Swimming Pool will be located at Kowloon Tsai in the area levelled to make way for the flight funnel of the new run-way at Kai Tak. The site which is some 35 acres is bounded by the hills (on the north), Inverness, Nga Tsin Wai and La Salle, Roads.
It is certain that the Pool will not be ready in time for the 1960 swimming-season, but you have my assurance that everything possible is being done to expedite the completion of this project."
MR. CHEONG-LEEN: -Mr. Chairman, couldn't you give an estimate of approximately when the swimming pool could be completed?
CHAIRMAN :—I am afraid, Mr. Cheong-Leen, I cannot give an exact answer. The design is not yet finalized. I think there is every reason to believe that it will be ready for the following swimming season.
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
MR. CHEONG-LEEN:----I take it that it is your New Year's resolution that you will do your best to see that this swimming pool will be completed as soon as possible.
CHAIRMAN: That is a very good New Year's resolution.
MR. H. CHEONG-LEEN asked the following question:-
"Quite a number of hawkers have complained to me that they are unable to carry out Council's requests or instructions because Council's official correspondence to them is in the English language, and they themselves neither speak, write, nor understand English; would the Chairman take steps to ensure that all English correspondence to hawkers have an unofficial Chinese translation attached thereto?”
THE CHAIRMAN replied as follows:--
"This question concerns the need for Chinese translations of letters emanating from the Department.
I am very glad that you have raised this question which is of particular importance in the Urban Services Department as we have dealings with all sections of the Community.
The procedure in this department is as follows: -
Letters are written in English, which is the official language, but the originators are well aware of the need for translation. If therefore they have reason to believe that the addressees do not understand English, they instruct the Interpreter/Translator, whose post was specially created for this purpose in April, 1958, to prepare a translation. Many of the letters and reminders are on standard forms and it is the normal practice for such forms to be made out in the two languages.
It is difficult to give precise statistics of the number of letters which emanate from this department but a rough figure of 2,220 per month would not be unreasonable. Of these probably 30% are on printed forms.
I feel that I should mention at this stage certain problems of translation. Chinese does not always lend itself to precise legalistic translation and there is always an element of danger in a hurried and possibly slipshod translation, which fails to reproduce exactly the meaning of its counterpart.
I am happy to say that, with the safeguards outlined above, no complaints have been received departmentally even though there may well have been instances when an alleged...
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