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Following is a question by the Hon Yeung Sum and a written reply by the Secretary for Education and Manpower, Professor Arthur Li, on behalf of the Secretary for Home Affairs, Dr Patrick Ho, in the Legislative Council today (May 24):
Question:
Regarding the implementation of the measures proposed by the Government in mid-2001 to enhance the role and functions of District Councils ("DCs"), the Government replied to a Member's question at the Council meeting on April 26, 2006. Regarding the reply, will the Government provide this Council with the following supplementary information:
(a) as the authorities are studying and following up the 195 suggestions put forward by DCs in the past three years regarding district leisure and cultural facilities and services, of the details of such suggestions, broken down by DCs and the following categories:
(i) construction of new leisure facilities;
(ii) improvements to existing facilities;
(iii) construction of new libraries or expansion of existing libraries, and provision of more mobile library service points;
(iv) extension of the opening hours of libraries and mobile libraries;
(v) expansion of library services;
(vi) construction of new civic centres; and
(vii) miscellaneous, for example, provision of carparks;
(b) regarding the suggestions put forward by DCs in the past three years about district municipal facilities and services, of the details of the 13 suggestions that will be reviewed from time to time and the 11 that have not been accepted, broken down by DCs and the following categories;
(i) construction of new public toilets or improvements to the facilities of existing toilets/aqua privy;
(ii) installation of air-conditioning systems in markets/hawker bazaar;
(iii) relocation of hawkers to fixed pitches with no restricted trading hours;
(iv) allowing on-street hawkers to choose whether to move into a newly completed market;
(v) construction or relocation of refuse collection points, dog latrine or central animal carcass collection point;
(vi) construction of new or temporary markets, improvements to the electricity supply of existing markets or retention of the existing rental scheme; and
(vii) disposal of home renovation waste; and
(c) of the numbers of meetings with DC members by each Director of Bureau and Head of Government Department since the commencement of the current DC term, with indication for DC meetings among such meetings?
Reply:
Madam President,
(a) A breakdown of the 195 suggestions put forward by District Councils (DC) in the past three years that are being studied and followed up is at Annex A.
(b) A breakdown of the 13 suggestions that are kept under constant review and of the 11 suggestions that have not been accepted is at Annex B.
(c) Since the commencement of the current DC term in January 2004 and up to May 23, 2006, our DC Secretariat records show that Directors of Bureaux or Heads of Departments have personally attended 69 DC meetings. As there were occasions when more than one Director of Bureau or Head of Department attended a DC meeting (for example, in the recent consultation on the DC Review, the attending government delegation was led by the Secretary for Home Affairs and comprised two Heads of Departments), a total of 106 such attendances were recorded. A breakdown of these attendances by the officials concerned is at Annex C.
DC members serve on a wide variety of government boards and committees; they will be attending meetings with Directors of Bureaux and Heads of Departments in their other capacities. Given the large number of DC members involved and their varied interactions with other bureaux and departments, it is not possible for us to provide the total number of such meetings between DC members and Directors of Bureaux and Heads of Departments, let alone a detailed breakdown.
Ends/Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Issued at HKT 12:55
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