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the USD staff are under the control of the Central Government instead of the Urban Council.
to
(b) Other charges Annually Recurrent, amounting $50,141,500—16.87%, say 17%, of the total expenditure. This expenditure can be said to be Administration Expenses of the Urban Services Department, which is a Government Department and also under the control of the Central Government. I therefore say that under this Heading we are also the pay-agent of the Central Government.
(a) and (b) to be added together, the amount will reach $25,784,700. That is 86.71% of the total expenditure. There remains only about 13% of total expenditure to be truly used for Urban Council business, that is to say, for the Urban Council to use in the public interest.
(2) This 13% expenditure comprises Special Expenditure and Capital Expenditure. The Special Expenditure consists of new items and re-votes with a total amount of $25,566,100 (8.60%). They are used for the direct functioning of the Urban Council. As Mr. CHEONG-LEEN said, for acquiring books and acquiring various equipment, the total expenses for the Capital Expenditure for the year 1974-75 amount to $13,950,000 (4.69%) of total expenditure. These two items to be added together amount to $39,516,100. This sum is still about $10,448,900 less than the fees and charges directly received by the Council. I hope that in the future at least the money directly received by the Council as charges and fees should be used directly for the functioning of the Urban Council.
(3) From the figures of the budget we all know that 4.69% for Capital Expenditure is too small. But we also understand that the big Capital Expenditure, such as the building of museums, abattoirs, stadiums etc. are to be done and financed by the Central Government. I would only query here that, if in future there is such need, who would take the initiative, Central Government or the Urban Council?
(4) We are pleased to have had a visit to United Kingdom and to have had talks with responsible officers of the Greater London Council and of Borough Councils which are local authorities. We have learned that the Greater London Council has an annual budget of about 900,000,000 pounds. This figure
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
is about 300 times more than the Urban Council's Special and Capital Expenditure combined together. They build public housing, roads, educational facilities, etc. for the benefit of local people. The present budget of the Urban Council would prevent us even to think about those matters. There is a long way to go even to make the Urban Council a true local authority.
(5) I noticed that the maintenance fees of vehicles for Headquarters for the year 1974-75 amounts to $5,800,000. But in each Division of USD there are still the running expenses of vehicles. Before the Urban Services Department becomes localized, would there be any duplication of such expenses? Mr. Chairman, with these comments, I support the motion.
MR. EDMUND W. H. CHOW (in English):-Mr. Chairman, this is the first budget since our financial autonomy. Gratitude should now be expressed to all those learned colleagues who have contributed so much of their time in scrutinizing and preparing this Budget. Our budget is a line item budgeting, prepared on objects-of-expenditure basis, it is anticipated that the Council will exercise more efficient control.
Our budget is no exception to any other budget which prefers manpower, material and machinery to projects, programmes and policies, although it is appreciated that man-power, etc. are used to accomplish projects etc. and the fulfilment of the latter requires the development of the former. Although we do not have much detailed information regarding those recurrent expenditures and other expenditures, etc., we may repose our confidence in the Finance Select Committee which has scrutinized the items.
Inasmuch as the decision taken today may commit and constrain our successors in the years ahead, this Council is duty bound to give every prudence to the items contained in this budget.
We have observed a deficit shown in the Budget. Whilst it is not intended to suggest that the occurrence of the deficit is in over-spending, it seems that this Council owes a duty to the public to explain to them whether the deficit is justifiable. It is appreciated that failure to show a deficit would indicate failure to attain optimal output. But the occurrence of a deficit would equally mean excessive expenditure somewhere in the Budget, especially when there is no provision for contingency or unanticipated expenditure. It may be a logical inference that the cause of the deficit is partly due to the Capital Expenditure in the coming year which is in the vicinity of 14 million
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