TNAG-1415-FCO40-1896-Public-finance-in-Hong-Kong-1985 — Page 181

171.

The largest element of the budget is expenditure on staff to which I made reference in my report for the year ended 31 March 1979. In paragraph 4.37 of their Second Report issued in January 1980, the Public Accounts Committee noted the view I expressed in my report that the Trade Development Council were in breach of the Government's and (to some extent) the Council's own policy, which provides that the salaries and benefits received by staff of subvented bodies should be no greater than those paid to officers of equivalent rank in the civil service and recommended that the Government should examine the matter in detail, in order to ensure that any breach of the policy which might exist, was immediately corrected. The Public Accounts Committee also recommended that as part of the annual examination by the Economic Services Branch of the Council's estimates, detailed checks should be applied to the level of salaries paid in relation to those paid by the Government, to ensure that breaches of the policy did not arise in future. The Government Minute of March 1981, in response to the recommendations made by the Public Accounts Committee, stated that the examination of the level of the Council's staff salaries would be done annually as part of the consideration of the Council's budget as a whole. In reply to my enquiries, the Secretary for Trade and Industry has advised me that, in examining the Council's annual estimates, he has satisfied himself that general salary increases to the Council's staff are broadly in line with those for the civil service. However, no detailed examination of the Council's salaries and benefits as recommended by the Public Accounts Committee has been undertaken, and in the absence of such an examination, the risk of staff in the Council receiving salaries and benefits much higher than those received by their counterparts in the Government to which I referred six years ago, still exists today. The Secretary for Trade and Industry has recently informed me that he is proposing to invite the Council to consider engaging a consultant to carry out a pay level study of the total package of salaries and benefits paid to the Council's staff.

172.

The second major item of the Trade Development Council's expenditure is promotional activities. The main services provided by the Council in this regard are:

direct mailing of research publications and regular press releases to create export awareness on the part of traders who are unfamiliar about their potential;