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Speeches & Questions of the Council

Question – Impact of shortening of requirement of residence in Hong Kong for Comprehensive Social Security Assistance Scheme (Priscilla Leung)

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The Court of Final Appeal (CFA) has earlier handed down its judgment on an appeal case, declaring that the requirement of seven-year residence in Hong Kong (residence requirement) stipulated by the Government for the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance (CSSA) Scheme was unconstitutional. As a result, the residence requirement must be restored to one year, i.e. the requirement before January 1, 2004…

Question – Road safety involving crane lorries (Lo Wai-Kwok)

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It has been reported that on September 14 of last year, the crane of a crane lorry in motion hit a directional sign which was six metres above the ground, paralyzing the traffic for more than two hours, and less than a month later, the crane of another crane lorry running on the road snapped two overhead cables of the Light Rail System, causing disruption of the Light Rail service for several hours. Regarding road safety involving crane lorries, will the Government inform this Council…

Speech – Promoting the economic development of Lok Ma Chau and Lantau Island (Jeffrey Lam)

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President, Hong Kong is a densely populated place with a large number of vehicles, and large shopping areas in districts such as Causeway Bay and Tsim Sha Tsui are particularly crowded during weekends and holidays. As there are few shopping areas over the territory, local people and visitors flock to these places for shopping.

Speech – Promoting the economic development of Lok Ma Chau and Lantau Island (Lo Wai-kwok)

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Deputy President, first of all I would like to thank Mr WONG Ting-kwong for proposing the motion on “Promoting the economic development of Lok Ma Chau (LMC) and Lantau Island” today. The original motion urges the Government to expeditiously study the setting up of a business and shopping centre in LMC, not only to capitalize on the geographical advantages and flow of people at the border, but also help to alleviate the pressure of popular shopping spots in Hong Kong, Kowloon and the New Territories, which are already crowded to capacity.

Question – Handling of complaints about water seepage in buildings (Lo Wai-kwok)

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Currently, the Joint Office (JO) set up by the Buildings Department and the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department is responsible for handling cases of inter-floor water seepage in buildings as well as coordinating investigations into and law enforcement actions about the relevant complaints. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council…

Question – Welfare benefits for Hong Kong elderly people residing in Guangdong and Fujian provinces (Christopher Cheung)

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The Social Welfare Department launched the “Guangdong Scheme” in October this year, under which eligible Hong Kong elderly people aged 65 or above who choose to reside in Guangdong Province may receive a monthly Old Age Allowance (OAA) and they are not required to return to Hong Kong each year. I have learnt that at present, Fujian Province is the place of origin of about 1.2 million Hong Kong permanent residents, and more and more elderly people have chosen to reside in Fujian Province in recent years. Yet, the Secretary for Labour and Welfare told the media a few months ago that at this stage, the Government had no intention of extending the coverage of the Scheme to provinces other than Guangdong Province…

Question – International school places (Jeffrey Lam)

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Some members of the business sector have relayed to me that the shortage of international school places in the Hong Kong, in particular primary school places on Hong Kong Island and in Kowloon, has deterred quite a number of talents interested in developing their career in Hong Kong from doing so as they are worried of being unable to find suitable schools in Hong Kong for their children. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council…

Question – Statistics on the transactions of private residential properties (Abraham Shek)

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Will the Government inform this Council of the respective numbers and total values of the transactions of private residential properties acquired by non-Hong Kong permanent residents and those acquired in the name of a company in each month between January and October this year, with a breakdown by transaction price of property…

Question – Monitoring compliance with dimensional standard of parking spaces for private cars (Andrew Leung)

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The Hong Kong Planning Standards and Guidelines stipulate that a standard parking space for private cars shall be 5 metres (m) in length, 2.5 m in width and 2.4 m in height. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council: (a) of the current respective numbers of private car parking spaces in private and public car parks in Hong Kong…