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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Works Select Committee would consider the whole area as an open hawking area, because there is a lot of complaints by the residents?
MR. CHUNG (in Cantonese):--Mr. Chairman, Mr. LEUNG must have good reason in asking to make this proposal, if he will make his case to the Select Committee it will certainly consider it seriously.
STATEMENT BY CHAIRMAN OF THE MARKETS AND STREET TRADERS SELECT COMMITTEE
MR. SHUM CHOI-SANG (in Cantonese):-As Chairman of the Markets and Street Traders Select Committee I rise to make a progress report and in particular to bring up the subject of the work of the General Duties Teams.
Members of these G.D. Teams are civilian staff who are trained in law-enforcement duties relating to hawker management and control. Their responsibility is to keep street trading under control, to keep public places clear of illegal hawkers and to regulate the activities of licensed street traders. They also perform a subsidiary role in the Clean Hong Kong campaign being empowered to issue warnings or summonses to hawkers, shopkeepers and litterbugs for the indiscriminate disposal of refuse in public areas.
At present there are 12 teams in the urban area, one for each of the 11 operational districts and the remaining one held in reserve to provide general support. Each G.D. Team comprises 150 members who generally are divided into two shifts of about 75 each. These two shifts work from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. and from 4 p.m. to midnight respectively.
The number of arrests made by G.D. Team members in 1982-83 totalled 51,520. In 1983-84 arrests rose to 75,948 (an average of about 1,500 a week or more than 200 a day). The average fine for 82-83 was between $100 and $120; we do not yet have the figures for 83-84 but believe they are about the same.
It is hoped in future to computerize the records of hawker offenders so that the Courts will be in a better position to decide an appropriate penalty taking into account whether an offender has a lengthy record of hawking offences going back a considerable number of years. We hope that we will have the computerization system as we deal with litterbugs, so that the court may consider giving out stiffer penalties to those long-time littering offenders and we hope that it will be a good way in handling repeated offenders.
In the longer term the Council is pressing ahead with the construction of more off-street market complexes to get licensed hawkers into suitable hygienic accommodation, and a good start has already been made on this in some districts. So far four market complexes are operating, at Aberdeen, To Kwa Wan, Ngau Tau Kok and Sai Wan Ho. Also there are 43 ordinary markets spread throughout the urban areas, plus six cooked-food markets. In the next five years nine more market complexes are scheduled to be completed plus two ordinary markets and five cooked food markets.
Furthermore the Council has set up a Working Party chaired by Mrs. Elsie ELLIOTT to look into all aspects of hawker problems and the Council's policies, and as part of its fact-gathering process it has begun interviewing on-street hawkers (both legal and illegal) as well as looking at hawking problems on the spot. The first visit took place recently to Sham Shui Po and Wong Tai Sin. Additionally the Working Party has begun consulting the District Boards to gain members' views on the hawker problems in their respective districts.
To return to the present, General Duties Team members have a tough job coping with a tough breed of people, namely both legal and illegal hawkers. There have been suggestions recently that the G.D.T.'s should be instructed to take a softer line; that they should give plenty of advance warning of their arrivals--if they do that, the offenders would be able to run away—that they should be dressed in civilian clothes to sneak up on illegal hawkers, and so on. May I make it clear here, the General Duties Teams would continue to work as before. They carry out the difficult work, policing streets, these are important work which we cannot avoid. The main problem is members of public continue to patronize hawkers along the street, particularly those who patronize unlicensed cooked-food stall operators. Once we shout 'Chau Gwei' (Raid!), and there are cooked-food stall hawkers immediately spurt, carrying with them the barrows with boiling oil, boiling fat, stoves and woks etc., this will endanger passengers, we must deal with these hawkers vigorously. Those who patronize cooked-food stall hawkers, in fact making us more difficulty and increase the danger of injuring street passengers along the streets. I hope members of public will re-consider before they patronize unlicensed cooked-food stalls along the street, and of course there is a risk of health.
ADJOURNMENT-3.22 p.m.
CHAIRMAN (in Cantonese):----That concludes the business of today's meeting. The Council stands adjourned until 10 July 1984 at 2.30 p.m.
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