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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
2. MR. HILTON CHEONG-LEEN, CHAIRMAN OF THE MARKETS AND STREET TRADERS SELECT COMMITTEE, moved the following motion (in English):---
'RESOLVED that the Hawker (Urban Council) (Amendment) (No. 2) By-laws 1989 be made under section 83A of the Public Health and Municipal Services Ordinance, Cap. 132.'
He said (in English):-Mr. Chairman, I rise to move the motion standing in my name.
It was a recommendation of the Working Party to Review Hawker and Related Policies that upon computerization all licensed hawkers should be required to display licence badges. The object of this was to facilitate control measures and also enable distinction of licensed and unlicensed in the case of mobile hawkers. Present legislation does not empower Council to impose this requirement.
Computerization of hawker licensing was commissioned on 6 April 1988 and all licensed hawkers are now in possession of the new licenses and license badges. It is timely, therefore, for Council to be empowered to impose this requirement to display license badges.
The Hawker (Urban Council) (Amendment) (No. 2) By-laws now proposed require the display of a licence badge, and establishes a penalty for failure to do so. The amendment By-laws have been agreed by the Markets and Street Traders Select Committee and the Standing Committee of the Whole Council. This By-law will take effect on 1 January 1990.
Sir, with these remarks, I beg to move.
MR. LAW CHAK-PIU, VICE-Chairman of THE MARKETS AND STREET TRADERS SELECT COMMITTEE seconded the motion (in Cantonese):--Mr. Chairman, I second the motion.
The question was put.
The motion was carried unanimously.
3.
MR. PETER C. K. CHAN moved the following motion:---
'Moved that this Council notes the contents of the Draft Basic Law and requests the Secretary to send Members' comments to the Drafting Committee through the appropriate channels.'
He said (in English):—Mr. Chairman, I rise to move the motion standing in my name.
Just by coincidence, I believe the timing of this discussion of the Basic Law Draft to all is very good as the closing day for public consultation is only 3 weeks from today.
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There was not much discussion on the production of the first SAR government as most of the discussion were on the composition of the first Legislative Council.
Let me refer Members to the Appendices as appeared on page 54 of the English text (Chinese text is on page 33), the Draft Decision of the NPC on the Method for the Formation of the first Government and the First Legco/Legislative Council of the SAR. The composition of Legco Membership was carefully enumerated in paragraph 6 of the Draft.
Out of the 55 members of the Legco, only 15 (appropriately 27% plus) will be district representatives normally we call direct election. Much discussion was focused on this percentage. Increase it to 50% may be a little too high for acceptance. While the publicised 4.4.2 model is being circulated for consensus, one private poll revealed that there was 58% of the people interviewed indicated acceptance.
It is not for me to comment on the accuracy of this poll whether it is a true reflection of anything, but I do believe that people in this society do have high spirit to compromise and find a middle of the road type of solution to a problem. Everyone is willing to give a little and take a little.
Some of my colleagues will probably be speaking on the bicameral system at a later stage with some details, but I must give some credit to the advocates of this system for bringing it out for discussion and has stimulated much interest in the debate of the Basic Law.
I do have an open mind to either the two chambers system or the one chamber system, each has its own merits and demerits.
But the most important question for HONG KONG is CONVERGENCE. If a conservative system is embodied into the Basic Law and a far more liberal system is being developed in the next few years before 1997 and convergence cannot materialize, it may be a disaster for Hong Kong.
If, at the end of the day, Basic Law embodied a bicameral system of Legislature for the future SAR Government, it would be better to develop a bicameral system before 1997 for easy transition rather than putting part of the membership into one chamber and others into another chamber. This may have to happen if Hong Kong is going to have a Legislature in 1995 with 50% membership coming from district election and the other 50% from functional constituencies.
Hong Kong's stability and prosperity depends on the continuous cooperation of the Chinese Government, the UK Government and the HK Government with the support of the Hong Kong people. With the gradual fading out, I hope they are fading out, of the megaphone diplomacy, and more official as well as unofficial exchanges of views, and finally around the negotiating table, I have to stress that all parties should make their effort to safeguard the Hong Kong people's interest which they all profess to protect.
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