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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Committees including those of Culture, Entertainment and Capital Works will draw up timetables to implement the proposal to provide facilities for the disabled. Thank you for speaking and thank you for your support.
The question was put.
The motion was carried unanimously.
(2) (a) MR. CHAN CHOI-HI moved the following motion:-
'Since the rates revenue of the Council in the next three years is still under consideration, RESOLVED that the Council should continue its usual prudent financial management to work out a budget to keep expenditure within the limit of revenue, and examine concrete and feasible proposals for increasing revenue and cutting expenditure.'
He said (in Cantonese):- Mr. Chairman, my motion today targets this Council's financial arrangement and tries to analyze from a macro point of view how we can operate effectively with limited resources without affecting the quality of our works and services. This may be a relatively new subject for Members; however, I feel that we should give thought to and face it positively.
At the end of November last year, a working group headed by the Chairman of the Urban Council negotiated with the Secretary for the Treasury and his representatives on the rates revenue of this Council for the three years 1997/98, 1998/99 and 1999/2000. I believe the Chairman as well as representatives of the Urban Services Department tried their best to lobby and convince the Secretary for the Treasury in the interests of this Council. According to the estimate of this Council, basing on 8% as the inflation rate, the total expenditure of this Council for the next three years would be in the range of $28.33 billion. If we take off the estimated income of $4.44 billion from various fees collection, we still have to utilize $1.44 billion of our reserve fund to pay expenses incurred in the next three years and ask for an allocation of $22.45 billion. The Secretary for the Treasury explained to us many times in the form of letters and through his representatives attending our meetings that after careful consideration of the relevant factors including the various needs of the Urban Council, he considered and proposed that the allocation of $18.7 billion should be able to meet the Council's expenditure in the next three years.
The Financial Secretary is expected to consider that amount in the light of government's rates revenue and then to propose a percentage of apportionment for the deliberation and approval of the Legislative Council. As rates revenue is an important part of the Annual Budget, the Financial Secretary will announce the proposed percentage when he delivers his Budget Speech on 12 March this year. That date is just a month away. In other words,