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Wednesday, March 29, 1972
Replying to criticism that Government's performance against intentions had been substantially less than adequate, he said a very large number of people outside the Civil Service were associated with the executive and decision-making process via membership of Government's network of advisory boards and committees.
"The whole system is designed to lay the performance bare."
Neither the Government nor the Civil Service complained about that;
nor about attacks on specific targets, he said.
"But these attacks must be seen against our total performance and the speed and accuracy of our responses to particularly urgent situations.
Sufficient Revenue
"They must be seen against our ability to raise sufficient revenue
for the public services without recourse to tax increases and here I would like to pay tribute, Sir, to the record of the Inland Revenue Department these past nine years under Mr. Duffy's leadership," he said.
They had to be seen also against Government's failure to make serious mistakes, for serious mistakes we can ill afford", he added.
The Financial Secretary said Sir Yuet-keung two weeks ago had
referred to
"Government activity moulded and restricted by a financial policy
and the
which ..... has erred on the side of conservatism and pessimism"
Hon. Szeto Wai had accused successive Financial Secretaries of "deliberately underestimating revenue to slow down the rate of growth of expenditure
This simply is not true," he said.
"Of course,