TNAG-1606-FCO40-22121-Minutes-and-Hansards-of-the-Legislative-Council-of-Hong-Kong-1987 — Page 201

Question No. 7

Reply by the Hon. Michael Leung, Secretary for Transport,

to a Question by Prof Hon POON Chung-kwong

in Legislative Council on 11.3.87

Question: Is Government aware of any indications of

speculation activities being carried out with regard to taxi licences, and, if so, does Government have any plans to tackle this problem?

Sir,

The value of a taxi licence has fluctuated in the

past few years : it fell from $237,000 in 1978 to $161,000

in 1984 and has risen rapidly to $450,000 at the time of the

last tender exercise in January this year.

In real terms,

however, allowing for inflation, the average premium of a

taxi licence has actually gone down by as much as 23% over

the last 10 years.

i

The Transport Advisory Committee has set up a

Sub-Committee under the chairmanship of Mr Jackie Chan with

a majority of unofficial members to carry out an overall

review of the taxi policy, including the question of

speculation of taxi licences. A recent survey undertaken on

behalf of the Sub-Committee has found tender price for

licences to be following the market price, and that the 'factors contributing to the rise in the value of the licence

include:

(a)

the profitability of taxi operation, which has a

direct bearing on the demand for taxi licences;