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required, as our staff in the future will look to us for much more guidance and instruction.

Handling our own finances is heady wine for the uninitiated. Likewise the vision of raising capital on the local money market to spend on projects. But this requires the establishment of our credibility as a good bet. This will take time and hard work to establish.

The expansion of licensing functions is fascinating, and I'm sure there will be a rush to join that Select Committee in the future, always provided, of course, that the Secretary for Home Affairs doesn't take all the fun out of these licensed premises, especially the topless and or bottomless variety, before 1973.

(Mr. Henry HU arrived at this point).

My remarks on the White Paper are necessarily proscribed by lack of knowledge concerning Government's thoughts on preparation for its implementation. Taking 1st April, 1973 as D Day, I suggest a Critical Path Diagram be prepared showing all the various processes and procedures that require to be dovetailed in. A Working Party composed of Members of this Council and Government to be set up to discuss and agree on broad principles, reporting back to the Standing Committee at appropriate intervals to keep the whole Council in the picture. I feel this would be a more useful procedure than passing it to our Local Administration Select Committee at this stage.

But perhaps you, Mr. Chairman, will enlighten us on the subject in your own speech in December.

However, I must reluctantly tear my eyes away from these visions of the future to comment on the rather humdrum, but very real problems of the present.

Resettlement Problems

Those of us who visited Tze Wan Shan Resettlement Estate on the 14th October, were quite shaken by the severity of the collapse of the slope in front of Block 28. Providence certainly spared a tragedy, as no one was even hurt. In this busy place many could so easily have been trapped. We all appreciated the anxiety of the tenants of this block, and the Commissioner and his staff are to be congratulated on the alacrity with which they sized up the situation and cleared tenants from the threatened block to other quarters. It was, however, disturbing to us to see trouble-makers attempting to make capital out of an unfortunate technical mishap, but it says much for the Resettlement staff officers in charge of Tze Wan Shan that they were able to calm the fears of the more responsible tenants.

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But what of other slopes in the area? Many of the blocks there and elsewhere are cut into quite precipitous slopes, upsetting the natural contours of the hills. Would regular inspections of possibly suspect areas reveal anything beforehand, or are the technicalities of the soil mechanics involved too problematical for accurate judgment.

It is praiseworthy that Members of Legco are now taking such a keen interest in parochial affairs, and indeed straying into what were previously regarded as Urban Council preserves. But it's a healthy sign, and to be encouraged by both the Administration and ourselves. Especially as in the final analysis, the members of the Finance Committee of Legco have the final say, in that they hold the purse-strings, and only they can release funds for many of the improvements Legco and Urbco Members consider imperative. In this context, conditions in Tze Wan Shan and Tung Tau Estates were graphically described by Mr. SALMON in his speech to Legco recently, and he used quite emphatic terms in urging Government to improve matters. I don't think any of us could improve on his comments, and I don't propose to try, as what I would say would be repetitious.

I note that in the G.I.S. handout covering the Legco Debate, Mr. LIGHTBODY's reply to these criticisms of conditions in Resettlement Estates is described as a "clarion call". My dictionary's definition of "clarion" is a "sound of trumpet". I hope this means what I think it means that he is now going to get the authority, backing and finance necessary to redress many of the shortcomings now so apparent in the older Resettlement Estates. I trust Mr. LIGHTBODY will be able to spell out in even greater detail to this Council, the measures to be taken to improve overcrowding, uncontrolled hawking, filth and so on. I am sure every Member of this Council will give his Department the backing he needs (and which is endorsed in the Statement of Aims of the two Resettlement Select Committees).

Environmental Pollution

In my speech last year I spoke at length on the subject of environmental pollution. The Director of Public Works, in his reply, said he would look into my suggestion to set up a separate committee to enquire into all aspects of water and land pollution.

I must say Government's reaction has caught me "flat aback" to use a nautical expression, as you will have noted in the Press and we have heard from you, Sir, they have invited me to be Chairman of an Advisory Committee on Environmental Pollution on Land and Water. Mr. Hilton CHEONG-LEEN, I am glad to say, has also agreed to serve on the Committee. Its terms of reference are:

(a) to keep under review the state of the environment as regards land and water pollution in Hong Kong;

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