New curbs on lavish spending by the chief executive will compel officials to explain why a lower-grade hotel suite was not chosen for the city’s leader on future duty trips, lawmakers were told on Thursday.

The outgoing director of the Chief Executive’s Office, Professor Gabriel Leung, told lawmakers that the proposed new guidelines would be given to the office of the incoming leader, Leung Chun-ying, before he takes office on Sunday, for him to put the measures into force.

The guidelines were drawn up following controversy over Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen’s lavish hotel expenses on official trips abroad. They come nearly a month after the Audit Commission found that Tsang had stayed in plush hotel rooms without good reason, and the Chief Executive’s Office had no internal rules to govern the choice of accommodation.

“In our guidelines, we will say very clearly: apart from fulfilling all these criteria [on spending] please also tell us why a [suite] one grade lower is not suitable and how much [its room rate] is,” Professor Leung said in a joint meeting of the panels on commerce, industry and economic development.

The audit earlier found that, of the 49 nights of accommodation paid for by the Hong Kong government – rather than hosts or sponsors – over the past five years, Tsang stayed in a superior suite on 41 of them.

The proposed new rules would require the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Offices to consider six criteria when deciding which suites to recommend to the Chief Executive’s Office. They include any sponsorship of accommodation by a host, organisation or country, and the nature of the facilities and design of the room.

“We will see if [the suite] can be used to hold meetings with the press, local officials and important persons in the political and economic sectors,” Leung said.

“In case of emergencies, say the outbreak of Sars in Hong Kong in 2003 and swine flu in 2009, and [if the chief executive] was on duty visit abroad – he would need an emergency control centre.”

Other considerations, Leung said, were security, diplomatic protocol to reflect Hong Kong’s status, auxiliary facilities required such as telecommunication services, and a complete quotation of prices from hotels.

Under the new plan, the Chief Executive’s Office should post on its website a record of its spending on duty visits every quarter; and such disclosures should be made within six months after each trip.

In future the office would explain in more detail to the public, after each trip, how it could benefit Hong Kong, Leung said.

As recommended by the audit, payments for the chief executive’s accommodation would need approval from the office’s permanent secretary instead of the leader’s private secretary, Leung said.

The leader’s office has asked the Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau to consider, again, whether the government should apply for a corporate credit card for spending on duty visits, Leung said.

The government reviewed the matter in 2006, he said, and found that using a corporate card might have more disadvantages than advantages, although he did not explain the disadvantages on Thursday.

Democrat Kam Nai-wai said the criteria for spending should include public sentiment.

Leung responded: “The public’s feelings are crucial … [As mentioned in the audit report,] such expenditure is sensitive in the eyes of the public. I totally agree with that, and I am fully confident that the next administration and relevant officials will give high consideration to it when [choosing accommodations].”

Tsang has faced calls to step down from office over his luxurious official trips and favours received from tycoon friends.

Editor Wang Xiangwei says the East is Red

This is reprinted from the websitewww.isunaffairs.com) Asia Sentinel welcomes tales of similar experiences. Send them to the editor atjberthelsen@asisentinel.com. This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

On April 22, Wang Xiangwei, the new editor-in-chief of the South China Morning Post, informed me that my contract with the newspaper would not be renewed when it expired on May 21. I can’t say I was surprised.

Sitting in a hotel restaurant in Hong Kong on a hot April day, Wang stared down at the table as the conversation began, seemingly unwilling to make eye contact. After a few minutes of chit chat, I asked him directly about my contract. He fidgeted and said he would not be able to renew it due to budget problems.

To me it was clear that this was a political decision. For seven months, he had basically blocked me from writing any China stories for the newspaper. During that period, I only had two stories in the China pages of the newspaper–one on panda bears and one on compensation for AIDS victims. Some two dozen other story suggestions went unanswered by the China Desk–in one case a story was approved, but the editor told me Wang had overruled him. A half-dozen emails to Wang pleading to write more for the newspaper went unanswered.

It certainly was not about money. Following my departure, Wang hired a spate of new young reporters, many apparently from the mainland. And if there were budget problems, why was I chosen to be let go? Obviously, there were newer people at the newspaper than myself. I had been on contract for two years, and wrote my first article for the newspaper in 1990, some 22 years ago. And I’d won 10 awards for my reporting for the newspaper, more than any other staff reporter.

When I offered to freelance and said I didn’t care about the word rate, he hemmed and hawed. When I asked if the newspaper could at least allow me to keep my journalist accreditation with the South China Morning Post, so I could continue to contribute articles to the newspaper, he muttered something about having to think about it. Despite several emails asking about this, he never agreed to do this. And there was no cost in sponsoring me.

When the news came last year that Wang had been appointed the editor-in-chief, I was quite surprised. For one, despite talk of him being a veteran journalist, he had little actual practical experience doing real journalism–far less than a lot of his staff. Wang had worked for the China Daily, done a master’s degree in journalism and had gone off to London on a training program, where he worked briefly for the BBC. As far as I know, he never “pounded the sidewalks,” as we American journalists say of a reporter who has spent years roaming around doing interviews.

He’d shown weakness in news judgment on many occasions, but more important, he’d long had a reputation as being a censor of the news, which may be what endeared him to Mr. Robert Kuok, the Malaysian tycoon who owns the newspaper, and his son and daughter, who took turns running it.

Talk to anyone on the China reporting team at the South China Morning Post and they’ll tell you a story about how Wang has cut their stories, or asked them to do an uninteresting story that was favorable to China.

Last November, I traveled to the US on holiday and decided to take a train to meet Geng He, the wife of rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, who had snuck past Chinese security guarding their Beijing home with a young son and daughter, making it all the way to Thailand and eventually political asylum in the US.

During a three-hour interview in a highway Burger King, Ms. Geng gave me unreported details about the harrowing escape through Southeast Asian jungles, much of it in the middle of the night. She cried as she talked about her husband’s treatment by brutal security people, and she smiled when she recalled her husband’s dedication as a lawyer. Tears fell as she described the difficulties the family was facing in the US. Both children　had been seriously affected by the treatment of their father here in China, which included serious torture and forced disappearances for lengthy periods.

An editor expressed interest in the story, but got back to me later in the day to tell me that Wang had spiked it. No reason was given.

When I was the second foreign reporter to see Gao during his brief respite from being disappeared, Editor-in-chief Reg Chua and Deputy Editor David Lague had a bitter argument with Wang, who was not keen to run the story. They wanted it on the front page, but Wang wanted it buried inside. They compromised by putting the story inside and cutting it slightly. Gao Zhisheng was obviously on Wang’s list of people not to be reported about.

When the government began its nasty crackdown against rights lawyers and other dissidents last year, one that saw people have black hoods thrown over their heads before being stuffed into cars, and then being taken to hidden locations, where most endured horrible torture, I saw an unprecedented pattern of intimidation and pain that clearly marked a new and frightening trend and so I suggested a story to the China Desk (David Lague, the deputy editor, was on holiday at the time). The story was immediately rejected by a China Desk editor, who said the newspaper had reported on tortured lawyers already. I wrote a short note saying this was a new and different trend, but I knew it would go unanswered.

When David Lague returned weeks later, I submitted the story to him and he immediately said to go ahead. I finished the story, but it sat on the China Desk for about three months, a practice I later learned was not uncommon when Wang wanted to let a story shrink in importance. When I wrote to David Lague, he pleaded he no longer had the authority he used to have. Silence of the Dissidents ran three months later, and I went on to win two awards for the story the China Desk tried to kill.

During their time at the newspaper, the two veteran journalists frequently battled fiercely with Mr. Wang over stories, with the daughter of Mr. Robert Kuok, the Malaysian owner of the newspaper, frequently siding with Wang. Insiders say the Kuoks long coddled Wang, believing he had influence in China.

Nor was I the only foreign reporter to be pushed out of the newspaper–I follow a long line of foreigners–each with long experience–who saw their contracts allowed to run out by Wang–this way he could plead innocence: You’ve not been fired, your contract ran out. There are now no foreign reporters working for the South China Morning Post in China–a first in a long while.

One good example is the case of former Guangzhou correspondent Leu Siew Ying, a native of Malaysia, who won the European Commission’s Lorenzo Natali Grand Prize in 2006 for her reporting on protests in the village of Taishi the previous year.

“She left the paper in 2007 after disputes with Mr. Wang about following up on Taishi and pressure from the Guangdong authorities,” Wall Street Journal Asia editor Hugo Restall wrote.

During Wang’s time with the newspaper, several foreign editors were offered the job of editor-in-chief, but most left after fighting a losing battle with the former China Daily reporter and member of the JinlinChinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. The Kuoks always made it clear where their loyalties lay.

But this is not just a case of foreign reporters being harassed. Talk to just about any one of the excellent Chinese or Hong Kong reporters writing about China for the newspaper, and, if they’re willing to talk, they’ll quietly tell about Wang spiking perfectly good stories or of being told to write more “positive” articles.

It’s interesting that the story that finally exposed Wang was one about the mysterious death of June 4 activist Li Wangyang, which barely got coverage in the newspaper.

After a sub on the desk questioned this gap in the newspaper’s reporting, about a story that other Hong Kong media had jumped on eagerly, Wang curtly told the sub off. “I don’t have to explain to you anything. I made the decision and I stand by it. If you don’t like it, you know what to do.”

When the news gained international attention, and his own reporters signed a letter asking for an explanation, a worried Wang responded with a statement to staff that he decided to run the story as a brief on the first day because he felt the newspaper didn’t have enough hard facts for a full story.

But what Wang failed to say was that the newspaper had in fact run a much longer story on Li’s death in its first edition and that Wang had chosen to yank it, shave it down to a brief for the next edition, and replace it with an article about former Taiwan President Lee Teng-hui and a conversation he had with a group of students–a story that had already run two days earlier.

What few have noticed, is that self-censorship is not the only problem. Possibly more worrying is the newspaper’s new-found proclivity under Wang to publish dubious stories that reflect Beijing’s views.

Earlier this year, deputy editor Tammy Tam gushed like a high school girl over a story about the Chinese Panchen Lama, asking only one serious question of a person who has never appeared in the Western media before. Eric X. Li, a well-known apologist for China, has been writing regular columns for the South China Morning Post. In one recent article he slapped Hong Kong citizens on the wrist for not welcoming mainland women to have their babies in the territory, and then wondering aloud if a people like this deserved the right to vote. Last week came a story by Professor Jiang Shigong, deputy director of Peking University’s Centre for Hong Kong and Macau Studies, that claimed “Hongkongers accept Beijing’s rule.”

In his own weekly commentary, Wang had egg on his face after predicting that disgraced Chongqing party secretary Bo Xilai had escaped any serious trouble. “Firstly, Bo’s political career looks safe for now and he has apparently managed to push back the pressure from his opponents within the party,” Wang wrote just before Bo fell hard.

Another article described Tibetans in Lhasa happily celebrating the Tibetan New Year, with quotes coming from one unidentified “middle-aged Tibetan man.” Meanwhile, more objective reports were reporting a dire situation in the Tibetan area. The article read like a China Daily story.

While the South China Morning Post continues to publish good critical reportage on China, the newspaper no longer has the status it had in the late 1990s, or more recently under three years direction under Chua and Lague, when the newspaper made great advances.

Under Wang’s stewardship, the newspaper has lost credibility with Hong Kong and international readers and is now often the butt of jokes in the local Chinese media there.

Sadly, the South China Morning Post, which has a history of more than 100 years of reporting on Asia, may be beyond the point of return. With credibility and morale at the newspaper sagging, and with controversies on the rise, competent journalists will now be reluctant to join the newspaper, and it can only sink deeper into mediocrity. The prospects for English-language journalism in Hong Kong is not good and this is sad.

(Reprinted from www.isunaffairs.com)

SCMP

Villagers and academics say Carrie Lam’s ideas on indigenous rights and welfare will cause controversy

New Territories villagers and social science academics say the woman tipped to be the next chief secretary will spark huge controversy with her ideas to end the small-house policy and reform the city’s welfare system.

Lau Wong-fat, chairman of rural affairs body the Heung Yee Kuk, gave a guarded response when told of development minister Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s latest remarks on the small-house policy. “This is only her view and only what she told you. I have never heard about that. I don’t want to comment,” Lau said.

Junius Ho Kwan-yiu, a lawyer and chairman of the Tuen Mun Rural Committee, was alarmed. “I am curious to know how the government interprets Article 40 of the Basic Law, which protects our traditional rights and interests,” Ho said.

He argued that male indigenous villagers’ traditional rights and interests include the privilege of building small houses, the right to burial (as opposed to cremation), the right to be free from paying government rent for land they own, and their interests in protecting the fung shui of villages.

“Does she want to limit it, or really cancel it? If she means the small- house policy should be improved, I can understand. If it is not, is it the right thing to do? I don’t understand,” Ho said. Asked if he thought the kuk would launch a judicial challenge, the lawyer said one had to “think twice [before doing] everything”.

Eric Cheung Tat-ming, an assistant law professor with the University of Hong Kong, said the government would need to conduct a thorough legal study if it wanted to end the small-house policy.

“Government lawyers must study the historical background, how the small-house policy evolved over the years. Only by a historical study can they deduce and define what exactly the traditional rights are – whether inheriting and selling a small house is part of these rights, for example – and be safe from a possible legal challenge,” Cheung said.

Malcolm Merry, a HKU law professor specialising in land disputes, earlier said the abolition of the small- house policy would be in accordance with the Basic Law, as the modern three-storey village house did not exist until 50 years ago and was not custom.

Democratic Party lawmaker Lee Wing-tat agreed the small-house policy should be terminated, but said the minister did not have to set a deadline as late as 2029. The government would have to conduct a public consultation, he added.

Lam already had a blueprint to reform the welfare system when she was director of social welfare, but failed to implement it because she had no power to control other departments, said Nelson Chow Wing-sun, professor of social work and social administration at HKU.

Chow said he suggested to Lam that she should allow only the elderly and the disabled to remain covered by the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance Scheme, and those who had the ability to work should be excluded.

He also proposed to her that the Labour Department help those excluded from the CSSA to find jobs. For single parents, a category of existing CSSA recipients, the department could help create suitable part-time jobs, so they would still have time to look after their children.”But then she told me that she met opposition and she had no power to control the work of other departments,” Chow said. “The CSSA is only to maintain a basic living standard, but cannot cater to the needs of different people.”

Fernando Cheung Chiu-hung, a social science academic and Labour Party member, said he was “scared” by Lam’s hints on welfare reform.

“Given her track record of curbing welfare expenditure, it seems to me that what she has in mind is more like a cost containment exercise than widening the safety net,” Cheung said.

He said he agreed with Lam that the CSSA scheme should be abolished, “but only provided that new social insurance systems [be implemented] to protect the unemployed, the sick, and the disabled, and subsidies for the low-income group, as in the US and the UK”.

joyce.ng@scmp.com

End small-house policy, says Lam

The woman tipped to be chief secretary says this rural ‘right’ cannot be preserved forever as she discusses her hopes for a ‘big social experiment’ to overhaul welfare

The candidate favoured to become the next chief secretary is calling for an end to what some see as the infinite demand from rural indigenous villagers for homes under the small-house policy.

In an interview with the South China Morning Post (SEHK: 0583, announcements, news)in which she outlined the challenges the next government must tackle, Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor also hinted at “a big social experiment” to overhaul the welfare system.

“Not long after my appointment, I talked to the Heung Yee Kuk and asked if they could draw a line,” she said, as she reviewed her term as the development minister since 2007.

“If life is unchanged for 50 years until 2047, as set out under the Basic Law, and only 18-year-old [or older] indigenous male villagers are eligible for a small house, how about ending it in 2029? I have asked them and offered different options. But they just didn’t come back,” she said.

Under her plan, the last generation to enjoy what the villagers regard as their right would be those born in 2029 and who would become 18 in 2047. The small-house policy gives male indigenous villagers in the New Territories the right to build a house close to their ancestral homes. It has drawn criticism because in some cases it is being abused for profit.

Lam said she now sees an opportunity to propose an end to the policy in the next five years. However, she admitted her relationship with some rural representatives had turned sour as a result of stepped-up actions on clearing illegal structures in village houses since April.

“They were agitated about my enforcement [on illegal structures],” she said. “Now that they realise the law has to be enforced, they would probably think about what to do with the remaining village zones that cannot accommodate all their [housing] demands. I do think the next administration should make a start.”

One of the challenges, Lam said, is to convince the public that the government may need to give something to villagers in return when the policy is ended. This could include providing more infrastructure to the villages and speeding up the application process with more efficient use of land.

On welfare, Lam, who was director of social welfare between 2000 and 2003, said she had in mind a “very big social experiment” to tackle poverty and narrow the wealth gap. One idea was to reform the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance scheme, calling it “a whole new paradigm shift to deal with poverty”.

“I have always felt that the CSSA is not the best scheme. If it is a good scheme, why are there so many ‘three-nothings’ and ‘four-nothings’ in Hong Kong,” she said, referring to the working poor who do not benefit from government relief measures because they are not welfare recipients, taxpayers or eligible for public housing.

Improvements to the safety net in the past five years included means-tested transport subsidies for workers, and vouchers for kindergarten education and for health checks for the elderly with private doctors.

SCMP

After five years at the helm of the city’s development, Carrie Lam says she has done her best. But she’d like to see thorny land policies and a welfare revamp resolved

Sitting in her office at government headquarters in Admiralty, overlooking the newly reclaimed waterfront, Secretary for Development Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor – who’s reputed to be tough – makes a confession.

As the end of her five-year tenure approaches, she admits she has been unable to resolve problems arising from the controversial small-house policy – which grants male indigenous villagers in the New Territories the right to build a house near their ancestral homes – because the government is not ready to tackle them.

Since 1972, the policy has allowed those villagers to build a three-storey house, with up to 700 square feet of space on each floor. But it has been abused by some for quick profits.

“I confess that I can’t do it because we don’t have that readiness to tackle such a big subject,” she said candidly.

This is a rare admission. The minister has never backed down in the past when faced with tough issues, from relocating the historic Queen’s Pier to make way for a bypass, to amending the law to make it easier for developers to acquire flats in old buildings for redevelopment.

She stood her ground on a plan to take away floor-area concessions from developers and in dealing with angry rural representatives who burned her in effigy after the announcement of a policy to clear long-standing illegal structures.

Although Lam’s “can-do” spirit seemed to dim on the small-house policy, she said the problem still needed tackling through high-level co-ordination. Lam, who is tipped to be the next chief secretary, said she was willing to confront the issue soon by calling on the incoming administration to end the policy.

There are numerous hot-button issues awaiting her if she serves another five years. She hopes the new administration can realise some of her ideas, including an overhaul of the welfare system and the establishment of a harbour authority, something she has pledged to achieve.

“I told David Akers-Jones that I would not allow the small-house- policy file to be stuck in my in-tray,” she said, referring to the former chief secretary who advised chief executive-elect Leung Chun-ying during his election campaign on a review of the policy. Akers-Jones administered the policy in the 1980s.

Lam said she gave up trying to resolve the small-house problems halfway through her term, when she found nothing could be done in the short term.

Firstly, she said, it is difficult to enforce the law in the New Territories. There was strong opposition, for instance, from villagers who were told to remove extra storeys built on their houses without permission from the Buildings Department.

Second, the government had to be pragmatic: it could not simply end the policy without compensating villagers who stand to benefit from it. This is something that may not sit well with urban dwellers, who already complain of unfair treatment.

“At least I didn’t compound the problem by giving [the villagers false] hope,” said Lam.

Rural villagers – including Heung Yee Kuk chairman Lau Wong-fat, who has been appointed an Executive Councillor – have repeatedly demanded more land for small-house development.

Those lacking land for further expansion can apply for a village expansion area [VEA], a measure introduced in 1981 allowing the government to use private land outside the village and provide infrastructure. Lam said she did not grant a single one during her term, explaining: “If the demand is infinite, how many VEAs would I have to create? Also, tension between the rural and urban sectors would be intensified as there’s already not enough land for building public flats.”

Rural land is rapidly running out, with just one-third of the original 4,960 hectares made available for small houses remaining, according to the Development Bureau.

Lam said drawing a line to end the infinite demand for village houses would send a clear signal that the government should no longer widen the rural-urban gap.

Another of her battles will be reforming the heavily criticised social welfare system, an idea that has been deeply rooted in her mind since she headed the Social Welfare Department from 2000 to 2003.

Lam said she had “two unfinished agendas” when she left the department. One is a coupon system for elderly beneficiaries that would allow them to freely choose the institutions they want to stay in, rather than be allocated ones that usually provide cheap, unsatisfactory services.

The second one is what she called “a whole new paradigm shift to deal with poverty” – an overhaul of the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance scheme. “The scheme, by design, cannot reach out to certain people for whatever reasons. Sometimes for a noble reason, these people don’t want to go on CSSA because of social stigma,” she said.

Lam, who has no deputy and often works long hours, is well known for initiating cross-disciplinary projects and policies that need other bureaus’ support.

One example proposed during her tenure is the plan to establish a harbour authority, a dedicated agent to upgrade the city’s waterfront, which would require the input of transport, marine and lands officials and those managing open space.

Public consultations, passing the required legislation and obtaining lawmakers’ approval for the authority’s funding is likely to take several years, and will fall to the future Housing, Planning and Lands Bureau, to be supervised by the financial secretary. Lam said “someone is watching” to ensure the plan won’t be shelved by the next administration.

Having described Victoria Harbour five years ago as an unpolished diamond, Lam said the government would not let the waterfront lie idle any longer. Various organisations have shown interest in occupying the newly reclaimed waterfront sites in Central before they are tendered out early next year, she says. The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra and Tourism Board plan to hold a concert and festival respectively.

The tenders are expected to bring public arts exhibits, pop-up restaurants and even a Ferris wheel to the Central waterfront. If the government worked in concert, she said, the harbour could be more vibrant with the introduction of large-scale water taxis, similar to the Thames Clippers in London.

Commenting on the role of the Culture Bureau, a new body to be formed and supervised by the next chief secretary, Lam said culture should be encompass city planning, education, industrial development, commerce, and promotion both overseas and on the mainland.

“The Culture Bureau is not just the usual LCSD culture,” she said, referring to the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, which is often criticised for being too bureaucratic and lacking in vision.

While Lam has repeatedly topped public opinion polls – partly due to the fact she has dealt firmly with property developers and rural villagers who are increasingly seen by Hong Kong urbanites as “common enemies” – it is unlikely that her popularity can stay at such a high level.

If she does become chief secretary, Lam will deal with even thornier issues such as political reform, and other matters that ride the tide of public approval and disfavour.

But when asked if she had any worries about the immediate future, she replied: “I never consider popularity in my work … It doesn’t bother me at all.”

She pointed out that if popularity was her main concern, she would not have opted for two widely criticised moves. One was her decision to cut CSSA by 11 per cent during the economic downturn in 2003. Another was amending a law in 2010 making it easier for private developers to acquire old buildings by lowering from 90 per cent to 80 per cent the threshold for triggering compulsory sales of remaining unsold flats in a block.

“I do it because I truly believe it was necessary to make a caring and just society. I never have this illusion that I will be popular in whatever position,” she said.

Despite the rocky patches during her term, Lam looks back on her track record with a measure of pride.

“The past five years were very, very exhausting,” she said. “But it was a very fulfilling five years, especially now. Wherever I go [in the city], I can point to my son and say, ‘Your mum has a part to play in this.'”

Known for rarely taking a break from work, she has recently been told to take it easy. Her doctor advised her to control her blood sugar.

However, Lam, looking at her future, says: “It seems I will have no break.”

CONTROVERSIAL POLICIES

2007 Went ahead with Queen’s Pier demolition despite public opposition

2007 Halted attempt by the owner of King Yin Lei to deface the Stubbs Road mansion only after they had started to do so

2008 Came under fire after buildings officers failed to order maintenance work for an old tenement in To Kwa Wan before it collapsed and killed four people.

2009 Announced the demolition plan for the West Wing of the Former Central Government Offices on Government Hill

2010 Curbed a policy that allowed developers to build green features in residential projects at low cost and include them as part of the gross floor area, making the flats look cheaper on a per-square-foot basis

2010 Got lawmakers to amend the law of compulsory sale for redevelopment, making it easier for developers to acquire old buildings

2011 Launched a “flat-for-flat” option under the new Urban Renewal Strategy. It offered new replacement flats for homeowners affected by URA projects, though the owners have to move to smaller homes if they get the option for free

2011 Announced plans to make Ho Tung Gardens a monument. The owner objected and some lawmakers hesitated to pay billions of dollars to the owner as compensation

2012 Cracked down on illegal additions to village homes, prompting fierce opposition from villagers.

IN HER WORDS

If a prerequisite for this open forum was to require the government or myself to pledge a “no-relocation, no-demolition” for Queen’s Pier, then, sorry, I can’t do it.

July 2007: on the demolition of Queen’s Pier in Central

I have never seen a developer willing to scale down its projects by this much … it has fulfilled corporate social responsibility.

The Legislative Council yesterday approved a HK$273 million interest-free loan to the exclusive Harrow International School for construction of its premises.

The loan is to meet “part of the construction costs of its new school premises” in Tuen Mun, and is part of the government’s commitment to support the international school sector to meet the demand for places for foreign families, according to a government document to the Finance Committee.

But Fung Wai-wah, president of the Hong Kong Professional Teachers’ Union, doubted the legitimacy of using taxpayers’ money to fund the school. Some critics also see the loan as another sign of collusion between the government and the private sector.

Harrow will be the first international school with boarding facilities in Hong Kong. It is expected to accommodate 400 primary and 750 secondary pupils when the first phase of construction is completed. There will be 99 classrooms, a boarding house, swimming pool, fitness room, an outdoor sports field and other facilities, the paper said.

Construction for Harrow’s premises is supposed to be completed by the end of the year. The first phase of the construction is expected to cost HK$878 million.

“As a non-profit-making organisation, [Harrow] can only obtain a bridging loan for the construction of school premises from private or commercial sources with the backing of the government’s interest-free loan,” the government paper said.

“The provision of an interest-free loan to [Harrow], which provides non-local curriculum for the international community in Hong Kong, will help in facilitating the provision of additional international school places to meet the demand.”

But Fung said taxpayers’ money should be used in a better way.

“Although generally speaking, the school is nonprofit, it’s not right to use public money to fund a school with abundant resources.”

He said the lack of international school places in Hong Kong should be alleviated from the root of the problem.

“There are many international schools in Hong Kong. It’s just that some are taken up by local students. We may have to rethink how to allocate those places to those who are really in need.”

The 3.7-hectare site at So Kwun Wat was allocated to the school in 2009, along with three other sites for international schools. Harrow is required to reserve at least half of its places for non-local students. The school’s first batch of HK$600,000 debentures sold out last year.

A report from moving consultant firm Crown Relocations in February found that only two international schools on Hong Kong Island, and four in the New Territories and Kowloon, had vacancies for Primary One pupils. The report surveyed 37 international and English Schools Foundation schools popular with expats.

Government figures show there is growing demand for British curriculum school places, driven by a 35 per cent growth in the British population in Hong Kong in the past five years.

ada.lee@scmp.com

Local newspapers have speculated that generous offers concerning rent and loans might have been granted under pressure from the Chief Executive, Donald Tsang, because of his son’s romantic relationship with the niece of the director of Harrow’s management company.

The school is being charged a nominal 1-thousand dollars in rent annually, for a site in Tuen Mun that is worth up to 1.4 billion dollars.

Legco’s Finance Committee has just approved a 270-million dollar loan – interest free – for Harrow to build its campus.

But the Undersecretary for Education, Kenneth Chan, said everything was above board and legal.