TNAG-0177-FCO40-213-Proposed-Polytechnic-1969 — Page 70

·AN ECONOMIC · REVIEW

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HONGKONG AFFAIRS

Then, in 1965, the staff realised that their counterparts in Britain had won

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that the old policy should be re-adopted by offering professors £1,000 a year more than British professors (and comparably higher rates for lower staff grades). The University got its way. Now an 8% rise is being claimed because local civil ser- vants' salaries have gone up by this amount. The University staff could also argue that their British colleagues have" won a 9% pay rise since 1965 But what the staff are not telling is how they (un- like the civil service) gained a 10% in crease in salary after the 1967 devaluation of the pound by insisting that their pay

291.

What is more important is that the principle of comparability with academic pay scales abroad be ended. The system could be tolerated in the days when Hongkong, University was supposed to operate as an institution for the spread of British influence in the Far East. To-

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the Labour Department, the University of Hongkong is in the middle of a serious wage dispute with the Govern- ment. Salary negotiations between the University authorities and the Govern ment (whose day is to protect the tax- payers' interests) have always been, com- plicated. At one stage the University's history, the staff insisted that their emolu ments needed to be kept appreciably', above, those in Britain to induce high- class staff to work in the inferior acade mic facilities available in Hongkong. The success of such "differentials", in solving recruiting problems was more than doubt-scales, previously based on sterling, betain the Chinese University could turn

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ful, the University has on occasion ad-,, mitted. In 1960, the University switched

! its line of attack and argued successfully, that their staff should enjoy standards of living more or less comparable to the civil service.

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comported in terms of the revalued Hongkong dollar. This fact would secin to provide a complete answer to the University teachers pay demands, parti- cularly as recruitment problems have cased significantly over the last two years.

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day its goals are presumably more 'con- ventional the unfettered pursuit of knowledge and the impartial education of "Hongkong's budding intellectuals. Offer a decent salary by local standards and, if the University's reputation stands high in the international academic community, the right recruits will surely come forward. If Hongkong University wins a pay rise simply because salaries have risen in Bri-

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round and demand comparability with the US om which so many of its teach- ing staff are inevitably drawn. This would make university education an even more expensive luxury than it al- ready is.

INDUSTRIAL TRAINING: A vocational training expert examines Hongkong's slow progress, towards im- plementing modern apprenticeship schemes and blames industrialists who expect Government to take the .full.responsibility for, worker, training.. na handsom anditul zubai ega, ut quis dium'ah', th

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A Little Learning

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By Johann Scholz & 45 Bay Sa

N' UNDERGROUND battle has been raging for some

AN se to train urgently needed skilled

workers for Hongkong's manufacturing industries. The con testants are the Government and industrialists who have seem- ingly sat back, idly hoping that official action would be taken. While repeatedly reminding the rest of the community of the importance of training skilled craftsmen, many industrial

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leaders have acted as though it was not their responsibility. Excepting pioneer efforts by the dockyards and some large engineering concerns, most have failed to initiate training schemes despite a 'government warning that it would only take "responsibility for institutional, "not practical, training,

At the heart of the controversy is the question of training" 'craftsmen. This is one aspect of vocational training which

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R GISTRY No.51

12 SEP 1969

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