HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
sions will be of great value to the community as well as to their departments.
As you know, Sir, there are at present six official members on this Council. I should like to say publicly that they have on all occasions fully co-operated with us in the interest of the public, and that the value of their work here can only be appreciated by those of us who have had the pleasure of working together with them, but I think I am right in saying that none of us not even our friend Mr. Hilton CHEONG-LEEN have ever tried to put our nose into the work of their departments which are not within the competence of this Council. Should it be possible for the Director of Education and the Director of Medical and Health Services to sit on this Council, I have no doubt that they will make very useful contributions to the work of this Council and its select committees.
The urgent need for hospital beds is an overall need of the whole Community, but I feel that the need is greater in resettlement estates. In spite of the very large population living in the area between Sau Mau Ping and Yau Tong on one side and Wang Tau Hom and Lo Fu Ngam on the other, there is no Government hospital to take care of those requiring hospitalization. The need is a crying one, and I suggest that Government look into this matter without delay. I suggest also that another hospital be built near the Chai Wan area on the Island. I am sure Mr. BERNACCHI will support such a proposal.
MR. BERNACCHI :-Indeed. I would.
MR. LI YIU-BOR continued:-Such hospitals should be general hospitals, and they need not be very large and elaborately equipped, as difficult cases can always be dealt with by our two major hospitals. I must confine myself to these remarks, otherwise my colleagues in the medical profession will accuse me of trespassing on sacred ground where angels fear to tread.
I think my friend Mr. CHEONG-LEEN will be disappointed if I say nothing about schools in Hong Kong. The 170-odd rooftop schools are doing a good job in educating nearly 60,000 children both inside and outside the resettlement estates, but so far they have not received any financial assistance from Government. Most of these schools have been run at a loss by the voluntary agencies sponsoring them, and they are meant to be so run, but because of the low fees charged and the limited resources of these agencies, the salaries of teachers in these schools have always been inadequate. I suggest that Government assist these schools by paying part of the salaries of their qualified teachers so as to attract more suitable young men and young women to the noble task of educating the really under-privileged.
With these remarks, Mr. Chairman, I support the motion before Council this afternoon. (Applause).
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
(At the suggestion of the Chairman, a brief recess was held at this point)
MR. J. L. MARDEN:-Mr. Chairman: A booklet was recently circulated to members entitled "Local Government in Britain", which again whetted our appetite for more and increased responsibilities together with the pomp and circumstance of a mayoral chain and aldermanic robes of office. However, this is not to be as since our last public debate a year ago we have progressed in the same way as the Red Queen in "Alice through the looking glass". We don't even get any biscuits to quench our thirst and the likelihood of us all being Queens together in square eight is just as remote. (Laughter).
Slaughterhouses
Although the completion date is now going to be about August 1967 for Kennedy Town and February 1968 for Cheung Sha Wan I am satisfied that there is nothing that can be done at present, that isn't already being done by the P.W.D. to hasten the finishing date. I called on the architects in Guildford during October and talked with the consulting engineers in Basingstoke and the delays are caused by the distance and the complexity of the buildings and the number of different departments that have necessarily to be consulted before any steps are taken.
However, the most important aspect of the whole situation is that once the slaughterhouses are completed they should be run efficiently. I don't know whether it is sufficiently realized that the combined total of pigs slaughtered in the Kennedy Town and Ma Tau Kok abattoirs was 1,868,435 in the calendar year 1964, and that this year it is running at a rate of over 2,000,000. With cattle the total was over 120,000 last year and this year it is running at the rate of over 150,000.
This will involve a great deal of money, far more than any individual commercial company in Hong Kong handles in a year, apart from the actual cost of the buildings. Therefore during the planning stages, and the first year of operation at least, one of the Assistant Directors should be working on it full time as the method of operation is entirely different to the present system, and it is essential that the transition is a smooth one. Nearly everyone in the Colony would be affected by any breakdown in the system. Also a realistic approach will have to be made by those concerned in the salaries and wages paid to the operators who will then be employed by Government.
Water Pollution
The question of water pollution is a world-wide problem although not necessarily always caused by sewage and an international con-
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