TNAG-0259-FCO40-295-Legislation-for-prevention-of-bribery-in-Hong-Kong-1970 — Page 124

HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL - 2nd October 1969.

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This leads me to an expression of opinion on areas in which industry needs urgent assistance. In most other countries where a large proportion of output of manufacturing industry is for domestic consumption, protection is usually accorded by either import tariff or import restriction, or both. Such forms of protection are not applicable to Hong Kong not merely because of our status as a free port, but also because of the export-oriented nature of our manufacturing industry. The safe-guarding of our manufacturing industry must, in fact, be effected by higher productivity in operation, more advanced technology in production and greater sophistication of products. All of these safe- guarding measures demand more and better trained manpower at all levels. We need more engineers and technologists. We need still more technicians and still more craftsmen and skilled workers.

It was encouraging to hear Your Excellency's statement yesterday that Government has made a determined start to advance over the whole spectrum of technical education*. But there is as great a need, on an even more massive scale, for industrial training in the basic engineering skills and for industrial supervisors, on which all industries depend. There is a great vacuum in industrial training for basic engineering skills at the craftsman level. As Your Excellency has very rightly pointed out, new processes and products not only require modern machines* but, more importantly, require craftsmen to look after these modern machines. There are many young men between the ages of 16 and 22 years who have had only a few years of formal education and who are not today productively employed. Had they been given the proper training facilities, I am certain many of these young men would have now been gainfully working in our manufacturing industries as engineering craftsmen and earning much higher income. This problem is not merely a matter of economics but must be viewed also from both political and social aspects.

It has been said in some quarters, including Government, that these basic engineering craftsmen like other skilled workers should be trained, as in most industrially-advanced countries, by industry itself. This is a fair enough comment in countries where industry caters mainly for the domestic market and where industry can be protected by import tariff or import restriction. The costs for such industrial training will be reflected in higher selling prices in the protected domestic market and will, therefore, eventually, and, in fact, be borne by the general public. This practice is not applicable in Hong Kong since over 90% of our production is for export. Furthermore, Hong Kong is probably the only manufacturing country in the world where incentives or sub- sidies to help promote exporting are not provided. Thus industry must fight its own battles both in the domestic market without any protection and in the overseas markets without any incentive.

* Page 4.