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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL

cussed in this chamber for in the forefront of our minds is the simple wish to make Hong Kong a better, a more wholesome place to live in.

In the spirit of offering something for study and discussion in the future I would like briefly to touch on two matters.

First, in English law there is a concept known as caveat emptor. Roughly translated it means, let the buyer beware. In practice this means that, if you go and buy something specific from another, you cannot complain later that it was defective or not suitable for your purpose. Another very old and much revered concept in English law is the sanctity of contracts. In practice this means that, if you agree to something with another, you cannot subsequently complain that the agreement was to your disadvantage.

At first sight these concepts are perfectly sound, and are perfectly acceptable to any society whose members deal with each other on an equal footing.

In a modern city state, however, if these concepts are left to develop unchecked, it would certainly mean that the small man will be taken advantage of by those sufficiently well organized, either through out-and-out fraud or by the small print of a well drafted agreement.

The whole of person's life savings can neatly be plucked away by a salesman of foreign deserts or wasteland, or of unprofitable mutual funds whose managements quite legally milk the undertaking dry. Excessive high interest rates enforceable by law can be charged to buyers of flats or of goods on hire purchase. For instance, if a flat worth $33,000 is to be paid for by 240 monthly instalments of $510 each, how many people would know that they were paying interest amounting to 18% per annum?

In recent press reports we have seen that 12-carat gold has been marked 18 carats and apparently all that the government has done about it has been to warn goldsmiths to be more careful in the future. (I should have thought the need was not for goldsmiths, but the customer, to take extra care).

In contrast with many other countries we in Hong Kong have few restrictions imposed on the preparation of packaged foodstuffs. Even pharmaceutical products may be manufactured locally without any exact description of their contents. No regulations that I know of have been made by the Director of Medical Health to secure the observance of sanitary and cleanly conditions and practices for the manufacture, preparation, storage or packaging of drugs for human use under the Public Health and Urban Services Ordinance, despite the fact that the Ordinance which empowers him to make such regula- tions was enacted over ten years ago.

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Mr. Chairman, we must not accept all this as part of a slick city life. We cannot leave it to the injured individual to take remedial legal action. Legal action is for the ordinary man in the street often far too expensive and always too late. And, while there exists a Com- mercial Crime Bureau in the police force, this section can act only after the event, and in any case does not attempt to deal with sharp practice as distinct from out-and-out crime. I propose that a study be made of the possibility of setting up an Anti Sharp Practices Bureau which could nip in the bud, before too much harm is done, any sharp practice designed to take advantage of the individual. Such a bureau may take private prosecutions for fraud, propose new legislation or simply publish warnings intelligible to the gullible where the sharp practice involved is not in breach of the law. Whilst the Bureau can- not be expected to uncover all the wiles and chicanery of a big city, its very existence will prove, I'm sure, a deterrent in a large number of instances.

The second matter that I would like to raise is the question of sentencing in criminal cases. I think it is very important for any society to have every confidence in the processes of the law, partic- ularly in regard to crimes of violence.

Much has been written on the philosophy of punishment. How- ever the terms used today are not dissimilar to those of Sir William BLACKSTONE 200 years ago. He said that the purpose of punishment was "as a precaution against future offences of the same kind. This is effected three ways: either by the amendment of the offender himself; or, by deterring others by the dread of his example from offending in the like way; or, lastly, by depriving the party injuring of the power to do future mischief The public gains equal security, whether the offender himself be amended by whole- some correction, or whether he be disabled from doing any further harm and if the penalty fails of both these effects, as it may do, still the terror of his example remains as a warning to other citizens."

Now, the questions of prevention and reform are probably best left to penal experts. The question of deterrence, however, is one on which, by its very nature, the public rather than the expert must be the best judge. Whether the sentence of one criminal will deter others from committing the same offence obviously depends on whether they, to paraphrase BLACKSTONE "are terrified by his example".

I do not think that any member of the public would be deterred from committing blackmail by the threat of a sentence of 3 weeks' imprisonment. Yet in a case in Kowloon a man found guilty on 2 counts of blackmail plus one count of demanding money with menaces was gaoled only for 3 weeks in total.

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