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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
The other point which we are going to advance, apart from the actual enlargement of the scope of the Urban Council by taking in the departments which we have recommended in the Ad Hoc Committee Report, is that no time should be lost in putting emphasis on whether the Elected Members should be elected on a territorial basis in the first instance or on a ward basis; that could be done in the second stage, because at this time it is far more important to create a Council which is representative of the interests of the people than to split hairs on secondary issues. The second stage would be the time for consolidating all those matters relating to franchise, to ward representation and to other departments that have not been absorbed in the first phase. And, it is only in the third stage that we will recommend the setting up of district councils.
Government on the contrary is believed to consider the setting up of district councils as the first stage of the reform of local Government. That would mean undermining the position of the Urban Council which has served Hong Kong so well in so many respects. That would be, Sir, an application of what I said before: the very old and discredited colonial policy of dividing and ruling. (Applause).
Mr. Chairman, these remarks are the broad outline of the intentions of the Select Committee on Local Administration. There are other matters about which my colleagues would like me to talk. First, on the question of public services: a short remark, Mr. Chairman, that the provision of public services in Hong Kong should be related to the needs of the people—where the people live, not where Government House is located and where the Heads of Departments live. It is a shocking example to see the Garden Road complex, made to serve a small population up the hill and mid-levels, while Government pays lip service to business and industry and neglects to build that very important complex which is needed at Kai Tak and Hung Hom. I experience all the shortcomings daily. The dispersal of the provision of services should be an important matter. It is not important to serve the people who can take care of themselves, but it is important to serve the broad mass of the population that needs the protection of the Government more.
My friends also would like me to suggest that there would be far less need to talk vaingloriously about the administration of justice if there were more social justice in Hong Kong. Time is dragging on without the provision of the essential matters which in a civilized community we can rightly expect of the Government: The social security about which so many of my colleagues have spoken. Mr. Chairman, if the Government were to secure the happiness and contentment of the people, the Government would have secured the best defence for Hong Kong. The best defence for Hong Kong lies in the happiness and contentment of its people and there can be no denying this fact. (Applause).
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Now, there are two other aspects of Council work which are fundamental and which called for comment from me in the past. The hawker problem. It is a complicated and involved subject. It is in the hands of a competent Policy Select Committee, but certain points which the Appointed Members made on the 12th June, 1968 might be reviewed again, and reviewed objectively this time, if the problem is to be tackled, if there is to be a fresh approach to its management aspects, and if it is to be sorted out at the grass-roots level. I personally, and my friends too, do not think that it should be tackled without an Unofficial Chairman on every district Committee which is in the interest of the Council in the long run. There is also a proposal by an Appointed Member, Mr. John BLAKER, on the question of the Hawker Control Force. There is a feeling that there is no reason for the Council to perpetuate a state within a state in the matter of control of hawkers. It is time that the police should accept this responsibility and deal with it properly, and the sooner this matter is brought under its control the better, but with the policy drawn up by the Council, and with only the execution in the hands of the police.
In the matter of recreation and amenities, Mr. Chairman, I am not impressed with the catalogue of Government achievements. I have been connected with the work for many years and I have listened with great "delight" to Government taking the credit from the Urban Council. Perhaps you have forgotten that the Urban Council published this booklet (tabled), where it was revealed that before the War the situation was pathetic and ten years after the War the situation was even more disgraceful than ever because of the increase of population. Then, under the instigation of the Urban Council, this tremendous progress was made. But, let us not forget that we have hardly scratched the surface of the requirements of play facilities for the people of Hong Kong. There are very few schools in the urban areas with playing fields and that is why the obligation devolves more on the Urban Council to provide common play facilities for the use of Hong Kong. I am not concerned with sport as much as I am concerned with recreation for the masses (Applause), and I think there is a strong duty on the part of the Government to provide even more play facilities, particularly in the old districts where virtually none exist or little in relation to the density of population. We should never sit back smugly and say we have done so much. Let us think of how much more we can do.
Lastly, Mr. BERNACCHI has asked me to point out to you that it was suggested that he joined the Council at the age of thirty, when by implication he was not really mature, but he remembers the first committee that he sat on concerned itself with the building of an abattoir. This was nearly 20 years ago and an abattoir became a reality only recently and Mr. BERNACCHI would like to remind you that an officer
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