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in this regard. At present, there are only limited venues for sports in Hong Kong. I take Hong Kong Island as an example. For Hong Kong Island, in order to hold athletic meets or inter-school sports days, apart from the Wan Chai Sports Ground and the Wong Chuk Hang Sports Ground, we only have the Hong Kong Stadium. The first two Sports Grounds have very limited seating capacity and the seating capacity is not as large as that of the Hong Kong Stadium. For the Wong Chuk Hang Sports Ground, it is rather remote and inconvenient and not easily accessible to students. If the running track of the Hong Kong Stadium is deleted, 160,000 students will not have the chance to take part in athletic meets. This will pose a very serious impact on students. The Hong Kong Stadium as a government venue should benefit as many people as possible. The utilization rate of the running track in Hong Kong Stadium is very high because it is the only venue for holding inter-school competitions. From September 1990 to May 1991, schools have used the stadium for 83 days. The stadium was made use of by the Caritas as well as the Tung Wa Group and other associations to hold their inter-school competitions. We can see from this figure that the issue will have a profound impact on the development of sports among school children. The present capacity of the Hong Kong Stadium is 25,000 and is rarely full. In future, when we have 40,000 seats, does it mean a waste of space or not? One thing definite is that the hiring charge will be substantially increased and the number of football matches held in the new stadium will definitely decrease. This will affect the development of soccer. Concerning the re-development of Hong Kong Stadium, some people said that we could expand the Wong Chuk Hang Sports Ground for the use of schools. But we must know that the re-development of Hong Kong Stadium will take place from April next year onwards to 1994. Can the re-development or the extension of Wong Chuk Hang Sports Ground be completed within this period of time? I think this is another cheque that may not be honoured so as to win the support of schools for the redevelopment of Hong Kong Stadium. If that is the case, it is quite worrying. I must reiterate that even if the Wong Chuk Hang Sports Ground can be expanded, the schools will not be able to hold their competitions or athletic meets in the coming years. Finally, I want to point out the management cost of the future Hong Kong Stadium. Since 850 million dollars will be used for re-developing the Hong Kong Stadium, in future is it necessary for the Urban Council to bear the cost? If this is privately managed and if deficits are incurred, will members of the public feel that the Council's decision was so hurriedly made? Since the aims of Urban Council are to provide the best sports and cultural activities for the public, we must be concerned about the management of the future stadium if the future hiring charge is so high that this will affect sports development. We can't tolerate the fact that 160,000 students may not be able to participate in athletic meets so as to strengthen their bodies because of the expansion of seating capacity of the Hong Kong Stadium. In view of the above reasons and the information supplied by the Schools Sports Association, I support the motion.
MR. RONNIE WONG (in Cantonese):- Mr. Chairman, on cancellation of the running track, our colleagues have already spoken a lot and I am sure the
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colleagues following may comment on the same point. I think the schools associations have already made their views known quite adequately through the mass media. I would just like to say that I share the feelings with the schools associations. I would concentrate on one point, i.e., after the Hong Kong Stadium is re-developed, with or without the athletic track, I am concerned about the question of management. The Urban Council is the most experienced institution in the management of sports facilities in Hong Kong. I think that the Urban Council should still be the management authority for the Hong Kong Stadium. The following points are listed to support my claim. First of all, the Urban Services Department has the biggest management team. We can re-deploy our staff quite easily. We can make the best use of our resources when we organize large programmes. We can re-deploy staff from other venues so as not to increase the expenditure unnecessarily. Secondly, our policy on charges is quite flexible because the Urban Council is financially autonomous. We have absolute freedom in the use of our financial resources. We can offer a concessionary rate to those organizations who cannot afford high rental fee or some charitable organizations. But to the commercial companies which can afford the fee, again we can impose on them a higher charge in order to offset the expenditure. The third thing is that the Council possesses a lot of venues e.g. the Ko Shan Theatre, the Hong Kong Coliseum and the Q.E. Stadium which uses are quite similar to that of the Hong Kong Stadium. If the Urban Council is asked to manage the Hong Kong Stadium, there will be easier coordination and detrimental competitions can be avoided and maximum usage of these venues can be achieved. If the management power is to be retained in the Urban Council, which already has a history of over one century and has already won the confidence of Hong Kong people. Then I think Hong Kong people will be more assured. But if we pass the management power to another authority, the citizens may get the feeling that the Hong Kong Stadium is only targeted for small groups of private clubs. So in the interest of Hong Kong people, I think the re-developed Hong Kong Stadium should still be managed by the Urban Council. With these remarks, I support the motion of Mr. Joseph CHAN.
MR. MA LEE-WO (in Cantonese):- Mr. Chairman, regarding the re-development of the Hong Kong Stadium, our colleagues have already spoken their minds. I would like to give my views in these areas. First, regarding the consultation and secondly the management of the re-developed Hong Kong Stadium. Obviously, on the redeveloped Hong Kong Stadium, the Government has never attempted to consult the Urban Council and other users of the Hong Kong Stadium. Actually, the consultations by Government only started recently. Actually, the SRC and RHKJC had already commenced the study on the re-development of Hong Kong Stadium last year. The Council having elected representative members and indirectly elected members have been kept in the dark. In this regard, I feel quite indignant. Regarding the final report of the consultancy, actually it was released several months ago. One thing obvious is that last year when the Recreation and Culture Branch briefed on this issue,
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