1973 — Page 88

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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL

MR. F. K. HU (in English):-Mr. Chairman, I understand that a private donor is interested to donate a swimming complex in the Aber- deen area. Can Mr. Chairman clarify the present situation?

CHAIRMAN (in English):-I would be very happy to do that. The information was given to the Standing Committee of the Whole that a donor has offered to pay for a pool in Aberdeen, and that matter is under very active consideration.

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(10) MR. TSIN SAI-NIN asked the following question (in Cantonese):-

(a) How many hawker licences (including fixed pitch and pedlar licences) can one person be allowed to hold at the most?

(b) At present, how many hawkers are there who hold more than two hawker licences (including pedlar licences)? Again, how many are there who hold more than three?

MR. HENRY H. L. Hu, CHAIRMAN OF THE HAWKERS SELECT COM- MITTEE, replied as follows (in English):

It is the Council's longstanding policy that one person should only hold one hawker licence, irrespective of whether it is a fixed pitch, cooked food, or pedlar licence. Indeed, the Hawkers Select Committee has recently extended this policy one step further with a decision that only one fixed pitch licence may be issued to one family unit, that is, husband and wife and their dependent children living at the same address. But I must make the point that it is very difficult to enforce the policy of "one man, one licence" or "one family, one licence", and it will continue to be difficult until a centralized Hawker Records Office is set up, and Hong Kong and Kowloon licence records are amalgamated into a central licence index.

However, from cases encountered in the day-to-day manage- ment of hawkers, both the Hawkers Select Committee and the department are aware that there is a certain amount of illegal trafficking in hawker licences, usually by mutual private agreement among licensees, and this often results in one person holding more than the one licence.

Turning to the second part of your question, I regret that at present it is not possible to say how many hawkers hold

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two or more hawker licences, and this type of informa- tion will emerge only when the proposed Central Hawker Records Office has been in operation for some time. Meanwhile, the Urban Services Department is doing its best to enforce the "one family, one licence" policy, and takes continuing action to cancel licences, particularly pedlar licences, whenever multiple cases of this nature come to its notice and can be conclusively proved.

MR. TSIN (in Cantonese): -I wish to thank Mr. Hu. Recently I have received quite a number of complaints, and that is why I wish to have a number of supplementary questions. Mr. Hu has said that before the setting up of a centralized hawker records office these ques- tions would continue to exist. I wish to know how difficult these questions are, and when will it be centralized, otherwise these questions would never be solved? Secondly, if there is a case showing that one person has more than one licence, and if one is a fixed pitch and one is a pedlar, which one is going to be cancelled?

MR. HU (in English):-This question of course needs detailed consideration. We, the Hawkers Select Committee, probably would discuss the setting up of the centralized hawker records office at the proper time, if the finances of the Urban Council permit us to do so. But anyway, we will discuss the two points which Mr. TSIN raised, and certainly would inform him of the results of our discussion.

(11) MR. PETER P. F. CHAN asked the following question (in English):-

Can the Council consider the installation of a coin-operated photostat machine in the Reference Library in the City Hall for use of the Public?

MRS. E. ELLIOTT, CHAIRMAN OF THE LIBRARIES SELECT COMMITTEE, replied as follows (in English):-

This question deals with the installation of a coin-operated photo-copying machine in the Reference Library at the City Hall for use by the public.

Subsequent to the promulgation of the Copyright (Libraries) Regulations 1973 on 1st June of this year, the Libraries Select Committee considered the provision of copying facilities for use by the public, and decided that coin-