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cancel some of our projects or services all because the central government has reduced its provision to the Council by $3.86.
To the best of our memory, we did stress at a meeting that in spite of our prevailing financial difficulties, no projects or services would be reduced. We promised the public that our financial problems would not be shifted to the general public and that we would not influence their livelihood by raising fees. We have made such an undertaking and shortly we will address the issue. I hope that all my colleagues still remember this earlier resolution and in our coming attempt to solve the financial problem, reiterate our position to the central government that we will continue to fight and that even if there was a deficit budget, we should not shift the financial responsibility to the general public because they have already fully paid the rates and there is no justification for giving them additional burden.
Having talked about the administrative and financial arrangements, I now turn to the issue of hawker control. I recall that once when the Public Health Select Committee was handling the questions of cholera and food hygiene, we mentioned that apart from the hygiene of food premises, there were a lot of unlicensed hawkers on the street giving rise to hygienic condition much poorer than that of the licensed food shops inspected and even the unlicensed ones. A resolution was also passed at the meeting whereby the Department should be asked to draw up a service standard in respect of the time required to handle public complaints about food hygiene, which should be dealt with as soon as possible like the complaints against hawkers causing environmental and hygienic nuisance.
I am sure a lot of colleagues share with me the impression that whenever we brought up the issue of hawkers for discussion, the Department as usual would provide the number of raids and prosecution against unlicensed hawkers in reply. This sort of reply was on many occasions rejected by Members as evaluation of their performance. The most important thing is to draw up performance pledge.
We flipped through the performance pledge mentioned by Mr. Lee Kwok-keung just now. For quite a number of services, the handling time required is given, such as the time required for the notification of venue-booking. There is a service standard for every activity, but in respect of hawker control, there is only one undertaking and that is, the working hours of the hawker control teams are from 8:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. How could this be taken as a service standard? It simply means that as long as the hawker control teams are on duty from 8:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m., then even if there are more than ten cooked food stalls operating on the street, they have already fulfilled their service standard.
Last time the Public Health Select Committee asked the Director of Urban Services to do something about the service standard in this area but the Director so far has made no response. This is the Department's usual practice.
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cancel some of our projects or services all because the central government has reduced its provision to the Council by $3.86.
To the best of our memory, we did stress at a meeting that in spite of our prevailing financial difficulties, no projects or services would be reduced. We promised the public that our financial problems would not be shifted to the general public and that we would not influence their livelihood by raising fees. We have made such an undertaking and shortly we will address the issue. I hope that all my colleagues still remember this earlier resolution and in our coming attempt to solve the financial problem, reiterate our position to the central government that we will continue to fight and that even if there was a deficit budget, we should not shift the financial responsibility to the general public because they have already fully paid the rates and there is no justification for giving them additional burden.
Having talked about the administrative and financial arrangements. I now turn to the issue of hawker control. I recall that once when the Public Health Select Committee was handling the questions of cholera and food hygiene, we mentioned that apart from the hygiene of food premises, there were a lot of unlicensed hawkers on the street giving rise to hygienic condition much poorer than that of the licensed food shops inspected and even the unlicensed ones. A resolution was also passed at the meeting whereby the Department should be asked to draw up a service standard in respect of the time required to handle public complaints about food hygiene, which should be dealt with as soon as possible like the complaints against hawkers causing environmental and hygienic nuisance.
I am sure a lot of colleagues share with me the impression that whenever we brought up the issue of hawkers for discussion, the Department as usual would provide the number of raids and prosecution against unlicensed hawkers in reply. This sort of reply was on many occasions rejected by Members as evaluation of their performance. The most important thing is to draw up performance pledge.
We flipped through the performance pledge mentioned by Mr. Lɛɛ Kwok- keung just now. For quite a number of services, the handling time required is given, such as the time required for the notification of venue-booking. There is a service standard for every activity, but in respect of hawker control, there is only one undertaking and that is, the working hours of the hawker control teams are from 8:00 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. How could this be taken as a service standard? It simply means that as long as the hawker control teams are on duty from 8:00 a. m. to 9:30 p.m., then even if there are more than ten cooked food stalls operating on the street, they have already fulfilled their service
standard.
Last time the Public Health Select Committee asked the Director of Urban Services to do something about the service standard in this area but the Director so far has made no response. This is the Department's usual practice.
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