HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Now let me move on to another matter that distresses me, namely, the double standards found in this Colony. Policies drawn up on paper seldom seem to represent the facts. One example is the Clinics Ordinance. It looks good on paper that the people of Hong Kong are to be protected against quacks and unqualified persons. However, if one delves into the facts, one finds loopholes whereby in private hospitals, provided they are duly registered, it would be possible for unqualified persons to diagnose, treat and even pronounce dead, a patient who has not seen the doctor. This is not a general complaint, but it is disturbing that in cases where it does happen, there is nothing one can do because of the protection afforded by the law.
Paper regulations and actual facts can be shown in all departments to be contradictory, creating a double standard. After making a complaint, the complainant is usually informed that the matter has been cleared up. Actually nothing has happened. Or he is told that his complaint was unfounded. A friend of mine recently reported that the noise of an electric saw in an illegal factory in Diamond Hill was driving her crazy. The matter was investigated. She heard from the Labour Department that while it was true there was a saw, it was not being used when the investigation took place; the complaint was therefore dismissed. A more serious matter still is that of drugs. Recently, after seeing with my own eyes two drug addicts in a certain area, I was told that there were no drugs there. Moreover, I was told that my allegations were without foundation and that I had caused trouble to law-abiding people. The addicts are still there, and are very much in need of hospitalization, while the traffickers go free. Government asks the people to co-operate by reporting drugs. I am not surprised that Chinese people are afraid to make such reports; that is the surest way of getting oneself into trouble.
I always understood that laws were made to control lawbreakers. This is not so here, as laws are made for those who wish to keep them. For those who do not wish to keep them, there is always a way out, and often it is the lawbreaker who becomes most prosperous, because he can avoid all the snags and expenses required by regulations. The law-abiding citizen asks why things are so difficult for him when his neighbour gets away with anything. Many laws are too stringent for those who are genuinely law-abiding, and too easy to break for those who are not.
One sore point is the regulation for private schools in Hong Kong. It is one of the paradoxes of Hong Kong that private schools have to register as businesses, and that their premises are decontrolled business premises with rents rising sky-high; yet at the same time they have to toe the line of the Education Ordinance. The Education Department, probably because of financial pressure from the usual quarters, refuses to face up to the fact that schools in rented buildings are completely crippled by exorbitant rents, and are quite unable to meet the physical regulations demanded by the Ordinance; yet they are rigidly kept to the regulations, unless, as usual, they choose to remain illegal schools. The Education Department has first choice of students, first choice of teachers, robs the private schools of any promising teachers by giving them training, but does not subsidize them to enable them to go back to their old schools. Yet with all these impossible conditions, the private schools are expected to conform to the same rules. If the Education Department is not going to assist the private schools and private school teachers, it should keep its hands off and renounce all right to control.
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Now I have a question for the Resettlement Department, just in case the Commissioner thinks I have forgotten him this year. How many squatters do we have in the Colony this year compared with the number last year? With demolished tenements, high rents, low wages, dangerous buildings, natural disasters, and illegal huts that have escaped attention, it would not surprise me to find far more squatters than we had last year. Why does Government put this heavy burden on the taxpayer, and let the landlord get off scot-free? By giving landlords a free hand, they, the landlords, are gaining what the taxpayer loses. A landlord can get rid of his tenants at one fell swoop, and develop his property to make a fortune in a short time. He builds his house five times the original size, and charges ten times the original rent, reclaiming his capital in a year or two. Why should he not be made responsible for the tenants he evicts? If we allow this to continue, we shall soon have a completely insoluble squatter problem on the taxpayers' shoulders. For the landlords' selfishness, Government punishes the tenants, by sending them to the back of beyond to erect a hut in a place without facilities, such as electricity, roads, drainage, transport, schools, and hospitals. A squatter from Hong Kong is sent far away in Kowloon. The licensed areas are going to be a blot on civilization, and I refuse to accept this recommendation in the White Paper on Housing. If Government is not ashamed of such treatment for what they dare to call "genuine squatters" or "genuinely homeless people", then I am ashamed for them. These poorest of the poor are being treated like impostors and outcasts. I request Government to give one honest reason why these people should be treated in that way. What kind of hypocrisy saves people from dangerous buildings and pushes them into more dangerous places during typhoon seasons? Those who made the decision should try a term of living the next typhoon season on those same spots. I cannot find words strong enough to oppose this crime against women and children.
It surprises me also that Government does not try to help to make the people in this Colony happier. For example, why does Government not take a lead concerning our uncertain industrial future? Hong
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