unsuitable for education subsidy, that there were more direct education expenses that should have been given a higher priority for subsidy and that there were even educational arguments against facilitating long journeys by students, except for the small minority who were unable to secure a place in nearby schools. However, the Secretary for Transport does not accept that any mistake was made and has pointed out that the relevant policy branch of the Government Secretariat holds the ultimate responsibility in the formulation of education policy proposals for the consideration of the Executive Council and that the proposals are not based on just the views of the Director of Education.
188.
Nevertheless, doubts were expressed by members of the Finance Committee of the Legislative Council about the operation of the student travel scheme as early as 1974. The scheme was already fraught with numerous administrative problems but the discovery that it might not have been serving educational policy objectives after all, combined with the need to find money for the expansion of secondary education, led to consideration being given to the possibility of abolishing the scheme. A working party, set up in 1976 to carry out a review of the validity and defects of the scheme, reported on the various administrative weaknesses which included, the suspected overpayments to transport operators because of the incidence of students using their annual passes infrequently, the difficulty in obtaining the agreement of the operators to adjust the level of their claims to allow for such under-use and the considerable administrative work by the schools, in processing the applications from their students, by the operators, in checking the applications and issuing the passes, by the Education Department, in checking the registers maintained by the schools, and by the Transport Department, in checking the operators' claims. The scheme was considered to be unsatisfactory because it benefited students regardless of financial needs and encouraged students to make unnecessary journeys. It was also considered unfair because it applied to only three transport operators. However, I consider that the decisive argument supporting the working party's recommendation to discontinue the student travel scheme altogether, subject to certain provisions being made for low income families, was the Director of Education's advice that the scheme did not contribute towards educational objectives, contrary to what the Executive Council had been advised in 1971.
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