TNAG-0453-FCO40-518-Budget-of-Hong-Kong-1974-1975-1975 — Page 174

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tend to emerge with three objectives, namely,

(1) the building up and maintenance of a storehouse

of information on prices of a selected range of commodities;

(2) acting as a clearing house for complaints and

drawing attention to what, by common consent, are clear-cut cases of what might be described as "profiteering"; and

(3) acting as sounding boards for consumer opinions

to arrive at a reasonable idea of what the public, at any one time, regards as an unscrupulous practice.

I think Hong Kong now clearly feels the need for a body of this kind and I am sure that private individuals would have little difficulty in obtaining the support they would need. The Government, for its part, stands ready to help such a body get off the ground with the speed the public mood demands.

117. Accordingly, the advice of Executive Council is

to be sought within the next week as to how a Consumer Council might be established, what its role should be, how it should operate and what form Government assistance should take. My own personal and preliminary views are that Your Excellency should appoint a nucleus of a Chairman and a few other members (all, of course, would be Unofficials) whose initial task would be to advise Your Excellency as to further membership, which should, of course, include persons with the necessary expertise as well as others able to represent directly the views of consumers. At the same time, these founder members might wish to advise on whether any Government officers should be appointed on a personal basis, having regard to their official duties and experience. The full Council, having been formed, would then settle down to develop an information service on prices and evolve techniques for identifying and exposing "profiteering".

118. To this end, the Government would be prepared to make available, on a regular basis, all information on supplies and prices of various commodities collected by the Census and Statistics Department, the Commerce and Industry Department, the Urban Services Department and the Agriculture and Fisheries Department for their own purposes. The Government

/would.....