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Governor; I try, I try so hard to be uncontroversial, but people do lead me on. We had, in the past, interesting exchanges about market research and opinion poll evidence but I think it would be injudicious of me today to talk about opinion polls, save to say that I don't think we could have managed to get through our agenda in the last four and a half years without the steady support of the great majority of people here in Hong Kong. And it is a matter of surprise but gratification that that support has remained as constant as it has.
I think I only want to say one thing in response to your question and it is this. I think it is rather offensive to the people of Hong Kong and perhaps a good deal too complimentary to this Governor or to the Hong Kong Government or the British Government for anybody to give the impression that the democratic institutions that we enjoy today - the Legislative Council, the Municipal Council, the District Boards - are somehow an imposition by the departing colonial power on Hong Kong. Those who have campaigned and argued for democratic institutions in Hong Kong, representing the majority of public opinion in doing so, those who have represented the growing aspirations of civic consciousness in Hong Kong should get the credit.
I was aware when I came to Hong Kong in 1992 that I had to find some acceptable middle-ground between the aspirations of Hong Kong and its political representatives - some of whom, admittedly, have since then changed their minds - I had to find some middle-ground between those representatives' aspirations and what was set out in the sacred texts in the Joint Declaration to which you referred, sir, and the Basic Law - which prescribed a modest, moderate, cautious process of democratic development.
I think we did that. I think we did that with arrangements which were genuine and which were fair. And I suspect that history will record that that was the problem - that they were genuine, that they were fair, and that they did therefore give people in Hong Kong the opportunity to see that their own political ambitions were properly and faithfully represented in the Legislative Council.
Now, I think all that argument, all that debate over institutions, has been accompanied by something else. I think Hong Kong has become, over the last four and a half years, a far more open, a far more plural society. So even if I deplore what may or may not be done with some of Hong Kong's institutions, I don't believe that the increased openness and pluralism of Hong Kong which has been accompanied as I said in my remarks, by greater economic success and by greater social stability, are things that can be simply rolled-up and put back in the cupboard. Were that to be attempted, I think the consequences would be extremely damaging for social harmony in this community.
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