1973 — Page 209

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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL

It is fit and proper for me to say that many public officials from a good number of departments work very closely with us in our com- mittees and we hope to invite more to join us; their collaboration is much appreciated and their goodwill fully reciprocated. Of course, Council has the strong support of the Director of Urban Services and his Department, including the Council Section, for which we are thankful as we are also of the assistance they give us in our committee work with their specialist knowledge and experience. Council has many honorary advisers and consultants whose work is most helpful and greatly appreciated.

Fundamental Functions-The Environment.

The Council has certain fundamental work to do, often overlooked but always of the utmost importance if living conditions in Hong Kong are to be kept up to as good a standard as circumstances permit. For sure, the select committees concerned are always searching for new ways to improve our manifold service. It covers environmental hygiene, food premises, markets, hawker bazaars, abattoirs, cemeteries and a host of other activities which all together make for better living conditions for our people. Improvements do not always depend only on the Council or the staff of the Urban Services Department but require most of the time the genuine co-operation of the public. The people of Hong Kong must actually want a better living environment; if so, they must be willing to exercise a good measure of social dis- cipline so that all may live together in a better way in our compact land area.

For instance, the Council and many government depart- ments together carried out a most successful "Keep Hong Kong Clean" Campaign in 1972, but it is not generally known that it was preceded by many years of exhortations by means of films, radio, television, posters and so on, together with cleansing operations and health education programmes, all with apparently little impact until the campaign got under way, and some pockets were hit though not hard enough. However, the degree of cleanliness then achieved has slowly deteriorated in many districts. It is easy for the thoughtless to say that the cleansing operations should be kept up and carried out more intensively but the truth is that they are. It must be with some shame that we learn that Hong Kong is perhaps the most frequently swept city in the world simply because, were it not so, the filth would have been intolerable, even more than it is now. Some areas are swept as often as six, eight or even ten times a day, in good part because of the selfish habits of the people. It would save the public purse many millions of dollars, which could then be used on other worthwhile activities for the good of the people as a whole, if better social habits

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made such frequent cleansing operations unnecessary. The Urban Services Department can only sweep the streets and remove the refuse, but it is surely up to the people not to discard refuse indiscriminately but to dispose of it in the proper way.

Now let us consider the problem of hawkers

Hawkers should not be thought of as a problem of the times capable of solving itself, perhaps more quickly if conditions were made difficult; rather, accepted as a permanent way of life in Hong Kong and integrated into the community structure. They have been with us for so long that a modus vivendi should have long since been worked out as much for their good as for communal harmony. Many studies have been made, many reports drawn up, and many recom- mendations put forward. True, in many ways the position is better than it was, even though local problems exist. At the same time, certain basic practical considerations must be recognized. First, haw- kers perform a useful economic function. So, they should be treated as businesses, no less, but certainly not as welfare cases. Indeed, many are said to be business enterprises of fairly substantial proportions. Next, Council must ensure that those who are broadly classified as hawkers are protected, not hounded, and their trading conditions regulated in the common interest. On their part, hawkers and their associations ought to impose their own control and discipline and readily co-operate with the Council to ensure that the regulations drawn up for the good of the community are followed. It is Council's avowed policy to put such hawkers into markets and bazaars where it can be done; but, where trading in the streets has become the practice, the conditions for doing so must be set out for all to know and observe. Such measures are for the protection of the hawkers themselves who are now often reported to be at the mercy of triad societies and other bad elements, just as they must be introduced in the interest of the community at large in order to avoid causes of friction on sensitive issues among other reasons. Areas and streets for hawking should be clearly designated and sites marked off. Then, the public authorities must effectively protect the hawkers so that they may be left to trade in peace, without interference so long as they keep the rules. Evidently, in return, hawkers must expect to pay a fair and reasonable charge; it is a community concession to be allowed to trade in streets and other public areas. In addition to a common licence for all, it may be necessary to levy a permit fee for the use of specific sites or according to the business they undertake. In this connection, I recall a very long-standing suggestion I made that perhaps the best way to maintain order and to regulate such a situation in the common interest would