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As an interim measure, the Travel Industry Council has asked its members to encourage their clients to take out travel insurance themselves and to provide them with detailed information on the travel insurance services available on the market. It has also advised travel agents to disclose details of any insurance coverage included in the travel services provided to their clients.
Turning now to the more specific points made by Members. Several Members have referred to the technical difficulties in requiring travel agents to take out compulsory group travel insurance for their clients and the need for the Government to undertake broad-based consultation before arriving at a decision on the best way forward.
In fact the Hon Miriam Lau, the Hon Chim Pui-chung and the Hon Henry Tang all urged the Government to conduct, to consult, concerned parties before formulating proposals.
We fully recognised the need for adequate and broad-based consultation. The Hon Miriam Lau suggests that working group join members from interested parties should be established to deliberate on the issue. In this regard, I'm please to point out that members of the Advisory Committee on the travel agents is already playing this role. It's members are all joined from all walks of life. In particular the Travel Industry Council and Consumer Council.
The Honourable Tam Yiu-chung suggested that a special fund should be established to grant ex gratis payments to victims of travel accidents. We will study his suggestion in conjunction with the proposal for establishing a contingency fund unveiled by the Travel Industry Council yesterday.
The Hon Fred Li has expressed concern about the proposal for establishing a contingency fund announced by the Travel Industry Council yesterday. We are awaiting the details of this proposal from the Council and will no doubt take into account the views of this Council in examining the proposal from the Travel Industry Council.