HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
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neeed to improve, but we must also reaffirm the achievements we have made last year.
Since the beginning of this new term, I have found that this term is different from past terms in that there are increasing elements of party politics. Sometimes there were confrontations or even personal attacks. At times, our discussions were too much focused on trivial matters so that our meeting times were lengthened substantially. Some colleagues have also criticized departments. So, I hope members will pay more attention to these situations and we should adopt a pragmatic and objective attitude to dealing with problems as far as possible.
Last year, there has been a lot more press coverage of the Urban Council, more than other levels or tiers of government, but the media tends to just report bad news instead of good news. In fact, some reports were long out of proportion and sensationalized. Some Members also made personal criticisms. I think our image has therefore suffered unnecessarily. I think we should work together and we have a duty to project to the public as faithfully as possible the image of this Council.
Some time ago, Members made known their wish to discuss the question of transitional arrangements for this Council for the sake of certainty. At the time, I thought it was not the right time to do so. But now is the right time to do so because we have a Selection Committee, we have got a Chief Executive, the Provisional Legislature and the Executive Council as well. And in fact, Mr. TUNG Chee-hwa visited this Council yesterday and there was wide press coverage. Well, hopefully we will keep in close communication with Mr. Tung to follow up on the development of this issue.
In the past year, the work of the Council has become more transparent and our supervision of progress of works have been more stringent. We have also paid more attention to the control of expenditure. Major projects have been commissioned and completed and these include the Walled City Park, Hammer Hill Road Leisure Pool, Jordan Valley Leisure Pool, redevelopment of the Ko Shan Theatre, three Urban Council complexes in Pei Ho Street, Hung Hom and Smithfield Road. Very soon, Siu Sai Wan Sports Ground will be commissioned. Other projects soon to be commissioned include the Health Education Exhibition and Resource Centre and also Shek Kip Mei Indoor Games Hall. Projects which have commenced or the designs of which have been finalized include the Hong Kong Central Library, the new Museum of History, Lei Yue Mun Museum and the Film Archive.
As for the establishment of the Department, it has been long established and there is no need for a major overhaul. But I also agree that we need to streamline the establishment and the current working procedure. There should be optimum maximization of human resources and we should deploy available manpower to necessary posts. We should also contract out more services such
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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
473
neeed to improve, but we must also reaffirm the achievements we have made last year.
Since the beginning of this new term, I have found that this term is different from past terms in that there are increasing elements of party politics. Sometimes there were confrontations or even personal attacks. At times, our discussions were too much focused on trivial matters so that our meeting times were lengthened substantially. Some colleagues have also criticized dlepartments. So, I hope members will pay more attention to these situations and we should adopt a pragmatic and objective attitude to dealing with poroblems as far as possible.
Last year, there has been a lot more press coverage of the Urban Council, more than other levels or tiers of government, but the media tends to just report bad news instead of good news. In fact, some reports were long out of proportion and sensationalized. Some Members also made personal criticisms. II think our image has therefore suffered unnecessarily. I think we should work uogether and we have a duty to project to the public as faithfully as possible the
image of this Council.
Some time ago. Members made known their wish to discuss the question of ttransitional arrangements for this Council for the sake of certainty. At the ntime, I thought it was not the right time to do so. But now is the right time to do so because we have a Selection Committee, we have got a Chief Executive, 1the Provisional Legislature and the Executive Council as well. And in fact, Mr. "TUNG Chee-hwa visited this Council yesterday and there was wide press coverage. Well, hopefully we will keep in close communication with Mr. Tung to follow up on the development of this issue.
In the past year, the work of the Council has become more transparent and our supervision of progress of works have been more stringent. We have also paid more attention to the control of expenditure. Major projects have been commissioned and completed and these include the Walled City Park, Hammer Hill Road Leisure Pool, Jordan Valley Leisure Pool, redevelopment of the Ko Shan Theatre, three Urban Council complexes in Pei Ho Street. Hung Hom and, Smithfield Road. Very soon. Siu Sai Wan Sports Ground will be commissioned. Other projects soon to be commissioned include the Health Education Exhibition and Resource Centre and also Shek Kip Mei Indoor Games Hall. Projects which have commenced or the designs of which have been finalized include the Hong Kong Central Library, the new Museum of History, Lei Yue Mun Museum and the Film Archive.
As for the establishment of the Department, it has been long established and there is no need for a major overhaul. But I also agree that we need to streamline the establishment and the current working procedure. There should be optimum maximization of human resources and we should deploy available manpower to necessary posts. We should also contract out more services such
Page 429 of 498
Page 429 of 498
Page 429 of 498
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