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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Fifthly, I stand here representing the constituency of males. Sixth, I represent the constituency of Hong Kong poets, seventh the constituency of yachtsmen, eighth the constituency of motor traders, ninth the constituency of racing drivers, and tenth, last but not least, I represent the constituency of environmentalists.
So you see one man can represent many constituencies and could have dozen votes! But because I only have 15 minutes for this speech I will confine myself here today to talk only as a representative of the appointed and the business community with just a little dash of the middle-aged giving advice to the impetuous young.
If Government in spite of the considerable opposition to the idea insists on functional constituencies then they must be defined much more clearly. Functional constituencies are obviously fraught with difficulties, i.e. if a businessman is to be elected by all the Chambers of Commerce and trade associations, those who are not members of these Chambers of Commerce and trade associations are automatically disenfranchised, and the majority of our trade and industry are not members of these associations. There is also a considerable injustice in the fact that there are many fewer bankers, lawyers and doctors than there are businessmen. A huge constituency of businessmen would get far less representation than the very small constituency of medical practitioners or lawyers. Also, of course, the odds are that one or two of the professional constituencies would be over-represented. Thus, for instance, there are quite a few legal eagles on this Council and on the various district boards so that it is quite possible that one lawyer will be elected via the electoral college and another via the functional constituencies. Moreover, many of us here would have two votes, one in the electoral college and one in their functional constituency. I think, possibly, the solution to this problem might lie in functional constituencies recommending candidates to the electoral college. Then it would be left to the electoral college to make sure that there will be a proper balance between lawyers, doctors, businessmen etc. But on the whole I must agree with the majority of those I've talked to that the idea of functional constituencies won't fly and should be dropped before it crashes.
Government really should be honest about this. They want functional constituencies because they see them as a possible replacement of the appointed system, but this is a bad way to replace the appointed system. I believe we should keep the appointed system and wearing my appointed hat let me tell you why I think the appointed system has great value in the Hong Kong context. First of all, and most importantly, in 1997 and beyond it will allow China to achieve a balance in the legislative process just as in the last 100 years it has allowed the British to do so. That this system works is self-evident and the results so far achieved in Hong Kong are impressive and let me give you just one reason: Businessmen as unpaid civic leaders with no political careers and prospects have an incentive to tackle community problems by whatever means are most effective.
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In other words, professional or even amateur politicians pursuing political or protest (special pressure group) organization careers cannot afford to allow their rivals to seem more radical and more democratic than themselves, which often leads to wrongheaded approaches to problems where easy and commonsense solutions are ready to hand, because the incentives of the two groups are quite different. Let me also remind you that the great majority of the appointed neither have the time nor the inclination to be full-time politicians but do quite sincerely want to contribute to the well-being of their fellow citizens, and it would be a tragedy to lose this pool of talent and good will, which in itself I think is sufficient justification for keeping the appointed system as part of the Governmental and Legislative process.
What is important is that Government must make sure that the functional constituencies are properly represented by the appointed also in future, i.e. they must listen to the various constituencies when they make their appointments.
One major criticism which must be made of Government is the Machi the Green Paper. It is issued during the holiday season when a great many people are not in Hong Kong and then only a two-month period is given for discussion. I think this is quite wrong. I think discussion develops thought and Government should have agreed to an on-going dialogue with its critics for a period of three months. And then a further period of at least four weeks discussion should be allowed for the White Paper when it is issued.
I think the most significant thing about the Green Paper is one extremely important omission and the fact that in the 14 months of discussion by pressure groups, the public at large, the press etc. this one omission has not been mentioned, which shows just how politically naive Hong Kong is. The omission is any reference as to how candidates standing for election to the Legislative Council will be chosen and by whom. Every totalitarian country whether it be pre-war fascist, post-war socialist, or post-war third world, has universal suffrage and direct elections. The trick, first used by the Soviets and the Italian Fascist in the early 20's, is for the ruling party or ruling Junta or ruling dictator to control the nomination of the candidates. It is essential that this sort of thing is prevented here and we must make laws to prevent it. I would suggest that anyone can stand for election to LEGCO who is over 30 years old, has a proposer and seconder to nominate him or her and is willing to put down a deposit of HK$5,000 which is forfeited if the candidate polls less than 5% of the total vote. Any other limitations on candidacies should be prohibited by law. Much more important than the issue of direct or indirect elections is to make sure that the electorate is offered a genuine choice of candidates.
I must repeat: The Green Paper seems to me to be a Mandarin's idea of democracy. There have been previous attempts at guided democracies in various countries in the world and they have always ended up as dictatorships. In our situation we have to be extremely careful to get our internal administration right.