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PROVISIONAL URBAN COUNCIL
"Due to insufficient funding from the Government to the Provisional Urban Council (PUC), some 50 PUC capital works projects cannot commence as scheduled. RESOLVED that the Council urge the Government to bear the costs and to start early construction of the capital works projects, in order to prevent the lands being left desolate and to enable the citizens to enjoy the facilities as soon as possible."
He said (in Cantonese):- Mr. Chairman, in recent years, Members kept knitted brows whenever our financial situation was discussed. The Council set a great number of work targets and should have had the ability to achieve them, but Government turned off the tap and was reluctant to allocate sufficient funds. Given the economic downturn and in consideration of the difficulties faced by citizens and traders, the Council has frozen venue charges and given rental concessions. As it goes, we have to work under very limited resources and reallocate the resources in hand. As we have to try and cover ten bottles with nine lids, some municipal services have to be sacrificed. We have no choice.
I am sure Members are aware of the large expenses entailed for capital works projects. You will understand why they are often shelved when there is financial constraint. If you have noticed, we have at present 20 stage III items or works that have had the "facilities details" endorsed involving $1.7 billion and 33 stage IV items involving $4.7 billion. Municipal projects "under initial planning" have been shelved. Whether they will be implemented will depend on whether we have sufficient resources and funds. Some Members recently suggested extending the remission period for licence fees and rental or freeze the measures for a year. According to the estimate of the Department, that suggestion will involve another $10 billion of financial commitment. Of course, the Democratic Party believes traders must be helped when they are faced with difficulties, but this will obviously have an impact on our proposed capital works projects. I don't know when works projects will be upgraded to items of priority.
As I understand, the greening group of this Council proposed some time ago to construct simple municipal gardens with green facilities at locations expected to be vacant for a long time. The suggestion will check against serious waste of land resources. I agree with this plan, but simple facilities should be provisional facilities, not long-term facilities. I don't want to see the Council's provisional facilities become like temporary housing areas of Central Government which are extended in periods of five years each time and labelled temporary again and again. I think some of the municipal services to be built on the above-mentioned locations cannot be replaced. If we classify all 55 capital works items carefully, we can see that 20 projects are for environmental hygiene and 31 are for recreation with the remaining one for construction of a municipal building complex. Let me point out that the project is not included in the budget for those shelved by the Council due to financial constraint,
Page 533 of 606
1 606
Page 533 of 606
460
PROVISIONAL URBAN COUNCIL
"Due to insufficient funding from the Government to the Provisional Urban Council (PUC), some 50 PUC capital works projects cannot commence as scheduled. RESOLVED that the Council urge the Government to bear the costs and to start early construction of the capital works projects, in order to prevent the lands being left desolate and to enable the citizens to enjoy the facilities as soon as possible."
He said (in Cantonese):-Mr. Chairman, in recent years, Members kept knitted brows whenever our financial situation was discussed. The Council set a great number of work targets and should have had the ability to achieve them, but Government turned off the tap and was reluctant to allocate sufficient funds. Given the economic downturn and in consideration of the difficulties faced by citizens and traders, the Council has frozen venue charges and given rental concessions. As it goes, we have to work under very limited resources and reallocate the resources in hand. As we have to try and cover ten bottles with nine lids, some municipal services have to be sacrificed. We have no choice.
I am sure Members are aware of the large expenses entailed for capital works projects. You will understand why they are often shelved when there is financial constraint. If you have noticed, we have at present 20 stage III items or works that have had the "facilities details" endorsed involving $1.7 billions and 33 stage IV items involving $4.7 billions. Municipal projects “under initial planning" have been shelved. Whether they will be implemented will depend on whether we have sufficient resources and funds. Some Members recently suggested to extend the remission period for licence fees and rental or freeze the measures for a year. According to the estimate of the Department, that suggestion will involve another $10 billion of financial commitment. Of course, the Democratic Party believes traders must be helped when they are faced with difficulties, but this will obviously have an impact on our proposed capital works projects. I don't know when works projects will be upgraded to items of priority.
As I understand, the greening group of this Council proposed some time ago to construct simple municipal gardens with green facilities at locations expected to be vacant for a long time. The suggestion will check against serious waste of land resources. I agree with this plan, but simple facilities should be provisional facilities, not long term facilities. I don't want to see the Council's provisional facilities become like temporary housing areas of Central Government which are extended in periods of five years cach time and labelled temporary again and again. I think some of the municipal services to be built on the above mentioned locations cannot be replaced. If we classify all 55 capital works items carefully, we can see that 20 projects are for environmental hygiene and 31 are for recreation with the remaining one for construction of a municipal building complex. Let me point out that the project is not included in the budget for those shelved by the Council due to financial constraint,
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