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Miscellaneous environmental fees to be revised
The Government intends to increase fees related mainly to the issue of various types of permits and licences specified in a number of environmental regulations concerning air, noise, water pollution control and waste disposal.
With effect from January 10, 1997, fees under the subsidiary regulations of seven ordinances, namely Waste Disposal, Water Pollution Control, Noise Control, Air Pollution Control, Road Traffic, Ozone Layer Protection and Dumping at Sea will be revised.
A government spokesman said today (Friday) that the proposed fee increases would generate about $2.6 million additional revenue a year.
He said that most of the fees were last revised in 1994.
"The revision is based on a costing review conducted recently by the Government which shows that many of the existing fee levels recover only a fraction of the costs involved. It is general government policy that fees should recover the full
costs.
"However, we recognise that to immediately recover the total cost would come as a surprise in some cases. In these instances we intend to phase in the increases over a number of years.
"The proposed increase represent a small portion of the operating costs borne by the relevant trades which should not affect their operations," he said.
Details of the proposed revisions are gazetted today,
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School Administration and Management System made easy
The Education Department will organise four School Administration and Management System (SAMS) days next month (December) to present comprehensive picture of the system.
SAMS is one of the Information Systems Strategy projects of the department.