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HONG KONG PROVISIONAL URBAN COUNCIL
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businesses related to culture, recreation and environmental hygiene. Our decisions are executed by the 16,000 staff-members of the Urban Services Department and arrived at through a democratic discussion process carried out by a body with 80% of its members elected. As such, it is different from other advisory boards.
Since the Urban Council is responsible for managing specific matters closely related to the community and the urban area covering Hong Kong Island and Kowloon, I simply cannot, for the time being, find any reason for its abolition. To transfer various functions and powers of the Urban Council to one or more government departments so as to have its operation replaced would have a negative impact on the Government. In retaining the Urban Council, the purpose is not so much to retain the number of members as to maintain a forum for the public to take part in the discussions and decision-making process concerning specific problems of livelihood. The problem now faced by the Urban Council is that heated debates have become a characteristic of meetings since democratic politics developed in Hong Kong and efficiency is undermined. But then this is the price of democratic discussions.
The role of the two municipal councils is to make decisions for the entire urban area and the New Territories while the District Boards, acting as the communication bridge between the Government and the public, collect local views and complaints and conduct local consultation. If District Board members were to discharge their duties properly, the area under their management must not be too large, or else they would have a hard time in coping with their work.
If the Municipal Councils were merged with the District Boards, a lot of insurmountable problems would be created. It is indeed puzzling as to how operation would be carried out if the bodies responsible for deciding issues concerning the livelihood of the people in the urban area and the New Territories and the bodies responsible for managing the interests of individual districts were merged. Furthermore, if the Municipal Councils and District Boards were first merged and then broken up into several councils, it would give rise to divergent policy decisions on the same issue. The review and study of reorganization must therefore take into full account these entangling and complicated problems.
As to the merging of the two Municipal Councils, there are a lot of supporting views on the grounds that the only difference between the two councils lies in the areas under their jurisdiction while their functions are in fact more or less the same. With the continuous development of the New Territories, the gap between the urban and rural areas is getting narrower and the earlier justification for division of management has already been lost. It is therefore an opportune time to consider merging the two councils, including rationalizing the structure, eliminating wastage resulted from duplicated resources allocation and unification of policies. There are however views that
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HONG KONG PROVISIONAL URBAN COUNCIL
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businesses related to culture, recreation and environmental hygiene. Our = decisions are executed by the 16 000 staff-members of the Urban Services IDepartment and arrived at through a democratic discussion process carried wout by a body with 80% of its members elected. As such, it is different from cother advisory boards.
Since the Urban Council is responsible for managing specific matters closely related to the community and the urban area covering Hong Kong Island and Kowloon, I simply cannot, for the time being, find any reason for its abolition, To transfer various functions and powers of the Urban Council to one or more :government departments so as to have its operation replaced would have a negative impact on the Government. In retaining the Urban Council, the purpose is not so much to retain the number of members as to maintain a forum for the public to take part in the discussions and decision-making process concerning specific problems of livelihood. The problem now faced by the Urban Council is that heated debates have become a characteristic of meetings since democratic politics developed in Hong Kong and efficiency is undermined. But then this is the price of democratic discussions.
The role of the two municipal councils is to make decisions for the entire urban area and the New Territories while the District Boards, acting as the communication bridge between the Government and the public, collect local views and complaints and conduct local consultation. If District Board members were to discharge their duties properly, the area under their management must not be too large, or else they would have a hard time in coping with their work.
If the Municipal Councils were merged with the District Boards, a lot of insurmountable problems would be created. It is indeed puzzling as to how operation would be carried out if the bodies responsible for deciding issues concerning the livelihood of the people in the urban area and the New Territories and the bodies responsible for managing the interests of individual districts were merged. Furthermore, if the Municipal Councils and District Boards were first merged and then broken up into several councils, it would give rise to divergent policy decisions on the same issue. The review and study of reorganization must therefore take into full account these entangling and complicated problems.
As to the merging of the two Municipal Councils, there are a lot of supporting views on the grounds that the only difference between the two councils lies in the areas under their jurisdiction while their functions are in fact more or less the same. With the continuous development of the New Territories, the gap between the urban and rural areas is getting narrower and the earlier justification for division of management has already been lost. It is therefore an opportune time to consider merging the two councils, including rationalizing the structure, eliminating wastage resulted from duplicated resources allocation and unification of policies. There are however views that
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