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HONG KONG PROVISIONAL URBAN COUNCIL
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Municipal Councils. I would like to point out that the mishandling of the bird flu crisis has much to do with the poor ability of Government departments in crisis management and their inadequate co-ordination. The mishandling has nothing to do with the existing mechanism of the Municipal Councils and these two things should never be lumped together. The remarks made by individual senior officials, to which I can hardly agree, are just foul means to distract attention and cover up blunders.
In the bird flu crisis, Members of the Council all worked closely together and came up with a lot of constructive suggestions to the Government departments concerned, including the Urban Services Department, calling upon them to take positive and appropriate steps to tackle the incident. In response to the Government's measures, the Council held a special meeting and decided to waive three months' rents for the Council's market stalls. Thus, the Council supported in action the Government's decision to slaughter all chickens. Regarding the consultation on restructuring regional organisations or any major overhaul, my views are that everything must be just and impartial. There should be no foul play which tries to get rid of the Municipal Councils on the pretext of the chicken incident.
Mr. Chairman, I hope all colleagues of the Council would set aside their prejudices, and join hands to build our metropolitan city and develop a Council structure befitting Hong Kong, so as to fulfil our mission of providing a great variety of quality municipal services for the community.
With these remarks, I second the motion.
Mr. Joseph Chan Yuek-sut (in Cantonese):—Mr. Chairman, Hong Kong is an open and flourishing city. With the improvement in the quality of life, the public have higher expectations on the standard of food hygiene and safety. In retrospect, the past year was really turbulent so far as food hygiene was concerned. We had our hands full all the time dealing with incidents which cropped up in succession. As Chairman of the Public Health Select Committee, I would like to express some views on these issues.
During the period from 8 to 20 May 1997, 13 successive cases of cholera occurred. Investigations revealed that the causes of the disease were food factories in extremely poor hygienic conditions. As the existing Public Health and Municipal Services Ordinance does not have sufficient deterrent effect, the Public Health Select Committee meetings held on 24 June 1997 and 8 October 1997 resolved that administrative power be conferred on the Director of the Urban Services Department so that she could effect immediate closure of unlicensed food premises and food premises in poor hygienic conditions. The aim of this resolution was to ensure public health by eliminating illegal operations and operations not complying with the health requirements. Unfortunately, the resolution was not supported by the Regional Council and as a result this Council encountered difficulties in an attempt to amend the
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