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Constitution and Administration

The Legislative Council Commission and Legislative Council Secretariat

The Legislative Council Commission is an independent statutory body, chaired by the President of the Legislative Council, with 12 other members. Its main function is to provide administrative support and services to the Legislative Council through the Legislative Council Secretariat. It employs the Legislative Council Secretariat's staff and oversees its work, determines the organisation and administration of support services and facilities, formulates and executes policies on their effective operation and expends funds in ways it sees fit to support these activities. The Legislative Council Secretariat is headed by the Secretary General. Its mission is to provide the council and its committees with professional and efficient support and services, enhance public understanding of the council's work and ensure the effective operation of its redress system.

District Administration

Hong Kong comprises 18 districts, each with a District Office, a District Council (DC) and a District Management Committee (DMC).

The District Offices are each headed by a District Officer, who represents the HKSAR Government at the district level in overseeing district administration.

The 18 DCs have a total of 507 seats, comprising 412 elected seats, 68 appointed seats and 27 ex officio seats (the chairmen of rural committees in the New Territories). Their current term of office runs for four years from 1 January 2012. The DCs' main function is to advise the government on matters affecting the well-being of the people in the districts, and on the provision and use of public facilities and services there. The government also consults the DCs on a wide range of issues. The DCs carry out district minor works projects and community involvement projects, for which the government allocated $340 million and $340.8 million respectively in the 2014-15 financial year. The government has undertaken to increase the annual provision for district minor works projects progressively to $400 million within the current and next DC term (ie by the end of 2019).

The DMCs are government committees chaired by the District Officers. Each DMC comprises the chairman, vice-chairman and committee chairmen of the DC and representatives of government departments providing essential services in the district. The DMC serves as a forum for consultation, co-ordination and collaboration between different departments and the DC to help resolve inter-departmental district issues and to ensure that district needs are met promptly.

In 2014, the government introduced a pilot scheme in Sham Shui Po and Yuen Long, providing the DMCs with power to decide on and co-ordinate work to address certain management and environmental hygiene problems of some public areas, with the DC's advice on the work priorities. So far, the scheme has been well received by the local communities.

There are also 63 Area Committees (ACs). ACs are district-based advisory committees which help organise community involvement activities, advise on local issues and promote public

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