XN000022-1996-11-02+03 — Page 9

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Governor's "Letter To Hong Kong" broadcast

Following is the text of the Governor, Mr Christopher Patten's "Letter to Hong Kong" broadcast on RTHK today (Sunday):

Just over a week ago, I opened an excellent exhibition in Edinburgh which showed what Hong Kong was like in the past, what it is like today, and what it could be like in the future. There were photographs, architects' models, videos and even some bamboo scaffolding. I was specially pleased that the exhibition homed in on two aspects of our life. First, it showed how ordinary people live - the development in public housing from the simplest housing blocks which replaced the squatter settlements destroyed by fire to today's more comfortable and roomy public Housing Authority flats. Second, it showed some of our projects for the future the ones that are going to give us one of the finest urban infrastructures in the world. The bridges. Renewal projects for old, run down areas of the city. The extension to the Convention Centre, where next summer's handover ceremony will be held.

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But of all the exhibits, one made a particularly strong visual impact on me. It was a blown-up photograph of the narrow end of a Mark 1 housing block, with the landings packed with people. Apparently, it was shot in Wong Tai Sin in 1965 during Chinese New Year. The people were all looking down towards the street as a parade of lion dancers went past.

It's a very striking photo. Full of action, and laughter, and the evidence which social history draws on. The poor clothing. The rough, unfinished cement on the walls. The graffiti far more than you'd see in a housing estate today. The cheerful sense of community solidarity working people and their families taken out of themselves for a moment by some happy spectacle.

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The people in the photo are every age, from grand-parents to babes in arms. They are not rich, that's for sure. They are city strivers, street sharp I'd imagine, and they probably needed to be to survive and prosper in a tougher economic climate.

So what would have concerned them? What would they have worried about. Rice bowl issues I'd guess. Their welfare. The roof over their heads: was it now safe from fire and landslip? How could they fit granny into the flat? What chance of the kids getting secondary education? How to deal with that hacking cough they'd had for years? Would they get a wage rise this year for making more plastic flowers and toys? How long would water-rationing last this year? Would it be possible to get a place on the bus for an outing to the beach at the weekend?