Page 18 of 126
32
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
District Health Inspectors in Sham Shui Po District have taken out 108 summonses against such offenders of which 24 were for premises in such streets as Castle Peak Road, Un Chau Street, Wing Lung Street and Pratas Street.
The second part of the question concerns measures that can be taken to eradicate the problem of extension of restaurant business onto pavements. In this respect, I think the answer to Mr. FUNG's question earlier on will also be applicable here. The five By-laws I just quoted for the restaurant operators to extend their areas into public places or to cause obstructions or to carry out unlicensed food premises also apply.
The last part of this question concerns whether the Council will consider any legislative amendments and prosecution in order to improve the environment and eradicate this nuisance. The existing provisions under the Public Health and Municipal Services Ordinance, Cap. 132 and the Council's policy through the Demerit Point System are considered adequate to control licensed establishments and the Demerit Point System was only introduced during this current year. Given that the Demerit Point System has been implemented just shortly for a short period, it is anticipated that there will be greater numbers of restaurant licences being cancelled as time goes on, unless the licensees cease this practice and know from other offenders being punished.
In respect of unlicensed or unlicensable establishments, application to the Courts for Physical Closure Orders may be necessary. In such circumstances, the premises will then be physically closed with all the utility services disconnected to prevent the premises from being used again as an unlicensed business.
(Mr. Albert S. K. Poon arrived at 3.12 p.m.)
MR. MA LEE-WO (in Cantonese):—Mr. Chairman, my supplementary question is: Will the Urban Council in the near future review the Demerit Point System to see its effectiveness in dealing with extension of restaurants business onto pavement? Secondly, I would like to ask who are those staff members in each district responsible for prosecution and what are the difficulties encountered by them to prevent restaurant operators from committing the same offence again?
DR. RONALD D. B. LEUNG (in English):-The Demerit Point System, as I said, was only introduced in this current year and so far, 14 Physical Closure Orders have been executed in the Kowloon Region in the past year. So, as I said in the reply, time will be a good test of the effectiveness of these measures and I think we should wait a little longer before we should consider to introduce other legislative amendments. As regards the manpower shortage, I think there are so many restaurants operating in the busy and overcrowded areas, I cannot say that there are always enough human resources to control this problem but I believe that the Urban Services Department have tried their best to deploy the staff wherever necessary in the black spot areas.
Page 18 of 126
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
STATEMENT BY CHAIRMAN, MARKETS AND STREET TRADERS SELECT COMMITTEE
33
MR. HILTON CHEONG-LEEN (in English):—Mr. Chairman, this will be my last statement in this Chamber after 34 years of service as an Urban Councillor. As Chairman of the Markets and Street Traders Select Committee for the past two years, I thought it fitting to give members a general idea of what has been happening in this field during that period and what to expect in the foreseeable future.
Hawker Control
Regarding the problems of illegal hawking and licensed itinerant hawkers, the Working Party to Review Hawker and Related Policies has continued its useful work in pursuing the implementation of the White Paper recommendations. The Working Party has provided an important forum for the in-depth exploration of new hawker strategies and policies prior to consideration by the Select Committee.
Over the past 2 years, there has been a steady reduction in the number of unlicensed hawkers. This may not be obvious in individual districts or in particular blackspots, but all available evidence confirms this reduction. This has been attributable in part to the prevailing climate in the labour market and in part to strenuous and unremitting departmental efforts.
In the Council's hawker control strategy, unlicensed cooked food hawkers have been a priority target together with protection of UC markets and licensed street traders. Since 1988, 21 squads of General Duties Teams have been created specifically for market protection. To reinforce departmental enforcement, special joint operations with the Police are regularly arranged to target notorious hawker blackspots, including late night raids in Wan Chai, Yau Tsim and Mong Kok, and the arrest of the unlicensed fast food van operators in industrial areas. To cope with the phenomenon of evening hawking activities in Causeway Bay, special arrangements were made for the General Duties Teams to maintain a late night presence. The Council's health education programmes also discourage patronage of illegal cooked food hawkers.
The General Duties Teams are drawn from the civilian supervisory grade, and they receive training in law enforcement duties. There are deficiencies and they have been recognized for quite a while. An inter-departmental Working Group was set up at the beginning of this year to further look into the feasibility of restructuring the hawker control organization. This was a key recommendation of the Government's Working Group on Hawker Control. In the meantime, to make best use of existing resources, other recommendations are being implemented including the payment of a special allowance, introduction of special General Duties Teams disciplinary arrangements and revamping of General Duties Teams training. Other measures already introduced having a direct bearing on enforcement include computerization of
Page 18 of 126