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Question 9: But the implication would be, sir, that if they had this much equity in hand and that is not all the equity they have in hand, they would have tremendous borrowing power, even more than they had at the time you were discussing the airport when they said they could build it on their own money and borrowing without ever coming to the government to begin with. So I am wondering why they just don't use that equity and their borrowing power to build the railroad instead of you having to put aside all this money equal to the potential costing of it over the next three years?
Mr K C Kwong: But Francis, you have got a fallacy there. If the money cannot be recognised in their books as profits it is not money which is usable. It is not even equity.
Question 10 (in Chinese): Mr Tsang, after the changeover if Mr C H Tung wants to proceed with certain welfare projects or other public schemes will the present financial reserves be enough to support all these schemes?
Mr Donald Tsang (in Chinese): I don't want to answer these hypothetical questions. As I said, we do have an objective. That is, when the SAR is set up Hong Kong can have very healthy finances and can have a cushion, and we hope that this can be achieved.
Question 11 (in Chinese): About the reduction of stamp duty for flats under $4 million, you mentioned that for these flats, these small and medium sized flats, most of them are usually HOS flats. I would like to know how did you arrive at that conclusion, how did you arrive at the conclusion that flats under $4 million are mostly HOS flats?
Mr Donald Tsang (in Chinese); I am saying that we are trying to assist those who are buying these small and medium size flats so that they will find it easier to become home-buyers and we believe that most of these flats are HOS and PSPS flats, Of course some of them are private flats. But even if they are private flats they will be in the lower and middle end of the market and they need our assistance more.
Question 12 (in Chinese): Mr Tsang, some LegCo members feel that since you are sitting on such large surplus you could afford to freeze fees and charges for government services. What do you have to say about that and how do you think it would impact on the government's revenue?
Mr Donald Tsang (in Chinese): I think we have to exercise discipline when it comes to fiscal management and if there is one day when we give up all our discipline it would not be wise on our part. And I am sure LegCo members will also treat this wisely. As I said, the reason why we have such a size of reserves is because of all the years of prudent fiscal management that we have effected and if we throw all of these philosophies out of the window, including abandoning the users pay principle, then the consequence would not be desirable.