A 06/07-33

Legislative Council

Agenda

Wednesday 20 June 2007 at 11:00 am

I. Tabling of Papers

Subsidiary Legislation / Instruments L.N. No.
1.Legal Aid (Assessment of Resources and Contributions) (Amendment) Regulation 2007114/2007
2.Environmental Impact Assessment (Exemption of Shenzhen Section of the Shenzhen Bay Bridge) Order115/2007
3.Declaration of Increase in Pensions Notice 2007116/2007
4.Widows and Orphans Pension (Increase) Notice 2007117/2007
5.Import and Export (General) Regulations (Amendment of Seventh Schedule) (Liberia) Notice 2007118/2007
6.Legal Aid Ordinance - Resolution of the Legislative Council (Commencement) Notice119/2007

Other Paper

No.96-Construction Industry Training Authority Annual Report 2006
(to be presented by Secretary for Education and Manpower)

II. Questions

1. Dr Hon Joseph LEE Kok-long to ask: (Translation)

According to the documents of the Hospital Authority ("HA"), HA has been working jointly with the health department of the Guangdong Province to arrange for mainland nurses to receive training and perform clinical nursing work in the public hospitals in Hong Kong. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council whether it knows:
    (a)currently, which public hospitals have commenced the above training of mainland nurses and whether other public hospitals will gradually commence such training; if they will, of the names of the hospitals concerned and the commencement time;

    (b)whether HA recoups the necessary expenses from the mainland nurses concerned, and pay them salaries for performing clinical nursing work in the public hospitals in Hong Kong; if so, of the amount involved, and whether HA will make reference to the usual practice and reimburse the relevant hospital departments using such income or disburse it to the front-line nurses responsible for supervising the relevant clinical nursing training concerned; if the expenses will not be recouped, the reasons for that; and

    (c)whether the above mainland nurses have obtained the practising certificates in nursing issued by the Nursing Council of Hong Kong; if not, of the reasons for that; whether the authorities concerned have assessed whether such nurses performing clinical nursing work is in compliance with the laws of Hong Kong, whether it will affect the quality of nursing care in public hospitals and solve the problem of shortage of nurses; if they have made such assessments, of the results?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

2. Hon Ronny TONG Ka-wah to ask: (Translation)

It is noted that the Government intends to publish in July this year a Green Paper on constitutional development, which concerns the ultimate proposals for the reform of the political system, and the public consultation exercise will last three months. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council of:
    (a)the number of issues on which the Government has published public consultation papers since the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, with the number broken down by the duration of the consultation periods;

    (b)the criteria and factors adopted by the Government for determining the contents of consultation papers, the duration of consultation periods and the means of public consultation, and whether various bureaux and departments adopt the same criteria for determining the duration of consultation periods; and

    (c)the criteria and factors adopted by the Government for determining the starting and ending dates for consultation periods; whether the period for the public consultation on constitutional development will be extended, taking in account that more members of the public will not be in Hong Kong because of summer vacation?
Public Officer to reply :Secretary for Constitutional Affairs
(in the absence of Secretary for Home Affairs)

3. Hon LAU Kong-wah to ask: (Translation)

Regarding the uniforms of the disciplined services, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the respective dates on which the different kinds of uniforms currently in use by various disciplined services were first introduced, the unit costs as well as the wear and tear rates of the uniforms, and in the course of designing these uniforms, of the places to which reference had been made with respect to the designs and standards of the disciplined services in these places;

    (b)of the views reflected in the past two years by disciplined services officers on the design, materials and wearing comfort, etc, of their uniforms; and

    (c)whether the authorities will review if the uniforms for disciplined services officers are suited to different weather conditions?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Security

4. Hon CHEUNG Hok-ming to ask: (Translation)

In September last year, the Government announced a proposal to reduce the coverage of the Frontier Closed Area ("FCA") from about 2800 hectares to about 800 hectares, and expected that the proposal would be implemented in 2010. In addition, the Government is conducting a planning study on developing a new boundary control point at Heung Yuen Wai, which is located on the land to be released, to link up Liantang in Shenzhen. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)whether it has examined the possibility of expediting the timetable for the reduction in FCA's coverage;

    (b)of the latest progress of the aforesaid study and whether any new satellite towns will be developed on the land released from the reduction in FCA's coverage; if not, of the reasons for that; and

    (c)how the authorities will, while reducing FCA's coverage, preserve the cultural heritage in the land concerned?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Security

5. Hon Frederick FUNG to ask: (Translation)

The Government published the discussion paper called "Building a Healthy Tomorrow" in July 2005 for public consultation on the future service model for healthcare. The Government subsequently indicated that it would conduct public consultation on healthcare financing in the first quarter of 2006. But the consultation was repeatedly postponed, and no specific date for the consultation has been fixed so far. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the latest progress in drafting the consultation document and the difficulties encountered, the reasons for repeatedly postponing the publication of the consultation document, and the expected time to start the consultation;

    (b)whether the healthcare financing options in the consultation document will include mandatory contributions, health insurance, improvements on the basis of maintaining the status quo, and a mix of these modes; if so, of the details, and the criteria adopted by the Government for choosing the healthcare financing options; whether the criteria will include the results of large-scale opinion surveys; and

    (c)given that the Government provided a number of estimated figures in the above-mentioned discussion paper, such as the projection that the proportion of public healthcare expenditure in tax revenue would increase from the then 22% to more than half by 2033, without setting out the assumptions and data on which such figures were based, whether it will make improvements in this respect when it conducts the new round of consultation, so that the public can have a clear grasp of the actual situation?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

6. Dr Hon Fernando CHEUNG to ask: (Translation)

It is learnt that the Hong Kong Jockey Club Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention ("CSRP") of the University of Hong Kong is conducting a study on suicides or suspected suicides by jumping onto the railway track. CSRP has obtained the details of each incident since 1997 from the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation but the MTR Corporation Limited refused to provide the information. CSRP then sought the information from the Environment, Transport and Works Bureau ("ETWB") but ETWB, citing paragraph 2.15 of the Code on Access to Information, rejected the request on the grounds that the public interest (i.e. the cost-effectiveness of installing platform screen doors) in disclosure did not outweigh the harm that would result in the individuals' privacy. The Ombudsman subsequently concluded that ETWB's refusal to provide the information was "narrowly-based and not justified", but ETWB refused the request once again. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council of:
    (a)details of each suicide or suspected suicide incident on MTR tracks since 1997, including the date and time of the incident, the station and location of the platform involved, duration of interruption of train service, impact on passengers, as well as the age and gender of the person who committed or attempted suicide; and

    (b)ETWB's grounds for continuing to refuse to provide CSRP with the information after the Ombudsman has made the concluding remarks?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works

*7. Hon Mrs Sophie LEUNG to ask: (Translation)

On curbing the proliferation of Mikania micrantha, also known as "the plant killer", will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)as the Government has advised that Mikania micrantha is found mainly at derelict fields, abandoned fishponds, hillsides and woodland fringe in the New Territories, whether it has found Mikania micrantha at the hillsides of Hong Kong Island or Kowloon; whether it has sent staff or contractors to conduct regular inspections in these areas;

    (b)of the number of contractors currently engaged to remove Mikania micrantha; and

    (c)what members of the public should do and which government departments they should inform should they find Mikania micrantha in public areas; and whether it has reviewed the adequacy of the information disseminated by the Government in this respect?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works

*8. Dr Hon David LI to ask:

Will the Government inform this Council whether it exercises any control over the number of vehicles in Discovery Bay, including but not limited to village vehicles, residents' coaches that run within Discovery Bay and those between Discovery Bay and places outside the area, light buses/hired cars with a capacity of less than 10 persons, and service vehicles; if so, of the following details of such control:

Type of vehicle Government department(s) exercising control Nature of control Number of permitted vehicles as of 31 March 2007 Increase in the number of permitted vehicles since 1 April 2004 Number of applications for operating the vehicles in Discovery Bay pending (as of 1 April 2007) Number of parking spaces in Discovery Bay
Village vehicles





Residents' coaches that run within Discovery Bay





Residents' coaches that run between Discovery Bay and places outside the area





Light buses / hired cars





Service vehicles





Other (specify type)





Public Officer to reply : Secretary for the Environment, Transport and Works

*9. Hon CHEUNG Man-kwong to ask: (Translation)

I have learnt that the Government currently requests universities to trade off their subvented first-year-first-degree ("FYFD") places for subvented senior year undergraduate places ("articulation places") to provide articulation opportunities for associate degree graduates. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the reasons for the implementation of the policy and its details, including the number of articulation places for which each FYFD place can be traded off; whether the trade-off ratios for individual institutions are the same and whether it has imposed an upper limit on the number of places that can be traded off by each institution;

    (b)of the respective numbers of articulation places for which each subvented institution had traded off its FYFD places each time in each of the past two years; and whether such places are included in the 3 800 subvented Year 2 and Year 3 undergraduate places to be provided additionally between 2005-2006 and 2010-2011 academic years as undertaken by the Government;

    (c)of the respective current unit costs of the above two types of places; and

    (d)whether it has assessed the impact of the above policy on the existing arrangement for universities to only provide a total of 14 500 FYFD places in each academic year, as well as on the opportunities of the Hong Kong Advanced Level Examination candidates in furthering their studies; if it has so assessed, of the results; if not, the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Education and Manpower

*10. Hon Abraham SHEK to ask:

Given Hong Kong's aging population, the number of cases of abuse of the elderly continues to increase. According to the Central Information System on Elder Abuse Cases, 522 cases were newly reported in the period from January to December 2006. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the number of newly reported cases of abuse of the elderly in the period from January to March 2007, broken down by the types of abuse, the victims' gender, relationship between victims and abusers, and victims' residential districts;

    (b)of the measures taken or to be taken by the Administration to encourage and assist the victims concerned in reporting their cases and seeking help; and

    (c)whether the Administration will consider stepping up education for the elderly in need in this regard, including enhancing publicity on the contingency measures and assistance available to them?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

*11. Hon Audrey EU to ask: (Translation)

Regarding the District Football Teams Training Scheme launched by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department ("LCSD") and The Hong Kong Football Association Ltd. ("HKFA") in 2000, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the latest progress of the above scheme;

    (b)of the support given to district football teams by the Government to promote a sense of belonging to the districts among their residents and foster the development of football as a sport in Hong Kong;

    (c)of the support provided by LCSD to district football teams which have been promoted to play the matches of the higher leagues of HKFA; and

    (d)whether LCSD has provided sufficient sports grounds for district football teams of the 18 districts to receive training and play matches in their respective districts; if it has, of the details; if not, the number of district football teams which are unable to receive training and play matches in their respective districts?
Public Officer to reply :Secretary for Education and Manpower
(in the absence of Secretary for Home Affairs)

*12. Hon Fred LI to ask: (Translation)

Although the Planning Department ("PlanD") is not the main licensing department, it is required to advise other departments on quite a number of types of licence applications. Recently, the owner of a fresh provision shop complained to me that the vetting and approving of his licence application was delayed by the authorities because the application was required to be processed by PlanD. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the number of types of applications relating to business licences on which PlanD is currently required to advise, and the average time taken by PlanD to advise on such applications; and

    (b)whether, in connection with the above problem, it has studied if the relevant procedures can be streamlined and the processing time for such applications shortened, so as to facilitate business operations; if it has conducted such a study, of the findings; if it has not, the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands

*13. Hon James TO to ask: (Translation)

It has been reported that the number of complaints received by Consumer Council in relation to the Continuing Education Fund ("CEF") has substantially increased from one case last year to 10 cases in the first quarter of this year. In addition, some 30 members of the public had made complaints about CEF to me last year. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)since the establishment of CEF,

    (i)of the respective numbers of complaints received by the Education and Manpower Bureau ("EMB") and Consumer Council, with a quarterly breakdown of the complaints by subject matter;

    (ii)of the number of substantiated complaints and names of the course providers concerned, and whether any course providers have been disqualified from offering CEF-approved courses as a result; and

    (iii)of the number of cases of delay in CEF reimbursement to students because the course providers concerned are under investigation;

    (b)whether a course provider under investigation by EMB can still register students for its CEF-approved courses; whether the relevant authorities have issued guidance specifying that course providers, if under investigation, shall disclose so to students during enrolment, EMB has the right to request course providers which are under in-depth investigation to suspend enrolment of students, and CEF can reimburse students before an investigation is completed; and

    (c)whether the removal by EMB of a course from the Reimbursable Course List will affect the eligibility of the students who are studying the course to claim reimbursement?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Education and Manpower

*14. Dr Hon KWOK Ka-ki to ask: (Translation)

It has been reported that last year, the Hospital Authority ("HA") commissioned a consultant firm to conduct a work-related staff opinion survey in which HA staff were invited to give scores to 18 items, including job stability, satisfaction, sense of belonging, remuneration package, workload, corporate image and training, etc. The results showed that the satisfaction levels of HA staff in respect of items such as working environment, satisfaction and leadership of supervisors had dropped sharply and fallen below those in the 2004 survey. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council whether it knows the scores given to each item by each of the ranks of health care staff in each hospital in the report of the above survey, and whether HA will respond to the scores by developing corresponding measures to improve situations such as staff working overtime and being remunerated differently for the same kind of jobs, so as to enhance job satisfaction of its staff? Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

*15. Hon Albert CHAN to ask: (Translation)

Recently, I have received complaints from fishermen of Cheung Chau, Peng Chau, Ma Wan and Mui Wo, alleging that many fishermen have engaged in fishing activities in inshore waters using methods destructive to the seabed and marine ecology, such as clam dredging. It has been learnt that many countries and territories have already banned such activities. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the respective numbers of such complaints received and the prosecutions instituted as a result in each of the past three years; and

    (b)whether it will consider strengthening the regulation of the fisheries industry by prohibiting fishermen from using fishing methods destructive to the seabed in inshore waters; if so, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

*16. Hon SIN Chung-kai to ask: (Translation)

Recently, a member of the public was convicted of publishing obscene articles because he had posted on an Internet forum a hyperlink to connect to an overseas web site with pornographic photographs. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)given that people posting hyperlinks on the Internet usually have no control over the contents of the hyperlinked web pages, and they may not be informed of alterations to such contents, whether it has assessed the liability to be borne by a person for posting a hyperlink to connect to a web site which did not contain obscene contents when he posted the hyperlink but such contents were uploaded onto the web site subsequently by others; if it has, of the assessment results;

    (b)whether it has assessed the liability of Internet search-engine service providers in respect of providing on their web sites hyperlinks connecting web sites with obscene contents; of the criteria for determining the subject of prosecution; if it has, of the assessment results; and

    (c)whether it will issue guidelines to the information technology industry, including companies and web sites providing Internet search engine service, to remind them of the matters to which they should pay attention and the actions they should take, so as to avoid infringing the law unknowingly by having, on their web sites, hyperlinks connecting other web sites with obscene contents; if it will, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply :Secretary for Security
(in the absence of Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology)

*17. Hon Albert HO to ask: (Translation)

The Law Reform Commission of Hong Kong published between 2002 and 2005 four reports on "Guardianship of Children", "International Parental Child Abduction", "The Family Dispute Resolution Process" and "Child Custody and Access" respectively. Since April 2005, the Administration has repeatedly postponed the date for briefing the Panel on Welfare Services of this Council on how it will implement the recommendations of the reports. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the efforts made by the authorities to implement the recommendations of the above-mentioned reports since their publication, and the reasons for the slow progress;

    (b)given that among the above-mentioned reports, the first three reports are being studied by the Health, Welfare and Food Bureau ("HWFB"), while the fourth one is being studied by the Home Affairs Bureau ("HAB"), whether the two bureaux have set up an inter-bureau working group to examine, from a holistic perspective, issues relating to the implementation of the recommendations of the reports; if so, of the number of meetings held by the working group so far; if not, how the authorities ensure that the results of the studies conducted by the two bureaux are compatible with each other; and

    (c)upon the reorganization of policy bureaux of the Government Secretariat, of the bureau to be responsible for those reports which currently fall within the purview of HWFB; how the authorities ensure that implementation of the recommendations of the reports will not be delayed further as a result of the reorganization; and whether they will consider immediately setting up an inter-departmental working group under the coordination of HAB?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

*18. Dr Hon Fernando CHEUNG to ask: (Translation)

Regarding the Chinese medicine clinics established by the Hospital Authority ("public CMCs"), will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)whether it knows the average figures of the following for each public CMC at present: daily consultation quota, number of patient attendances, utilization rate and number of patients who fail to obtain consultation slots;

    (b)whether it knows the special arrangements made by each public CMC for Comprehensive Social Security Assistance ("CSSA") recipients, such as the daily consultation quotas designated for them and restriction on their frequency of consultation, and whether arrangements have been made for these recipients to receive treatment at another time when the consultation quotas are exhausted; if there are such arrangements, of the average waiting time required; and

    (c)given that the number of public CMCs will only be increased from nine at present to 14 in 2009, whether the Government has reviewed the needs of elderly CSSA recipients to receive treatment at public CMCs, and whether the Government will provide subsidies to the elderly CSSA recipients who fail to get consultation slots at public CMCs and thus need to seek treatment at private CMCs?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

*19. Hon Emily LAU to ask: (Translation)

When he attended radio programmes on several occasions recently, the Convenor of the Executive Council said that the Central Authorities had the substantive power to appoint the Chief Executive ("CE"), and hence the design of a model for selecting CE by universal suffrage had to ensure that the person elected was a person whom the Central Authorities were willing to appoint; otherwise, there would be a constitutional crisis. He further commented that the issue of selection of CE by universal suffrage was even more complicated and difficult than that of election of all members of the Legislative Council ("LegCo") by universal suffrage. It has also been reported that the Central Authorities expect to have "prior communication" with Hong Kong in respect of the selection of CE by universal suffrage in the future, and the nomination of CE candidates by the nominating committee must be its "nomination as a whole", as such arrangements can ensure that the CE to be selected by universal suffrage will be a person whom the Central Authorities are pleased to appoint. In this connection, will the Executive Authorities inform this Council:
    (a)whether they have assessed the likelihood of a constitutional crisis triggered by a CE selected by universal suffrage being not appointed by the Central Authorities, and of the ways to deal with such a situation;

    (b)whether the Committee on Governance and Political Development of the Commission on Strategic Development ("CSD") has discussed the arrangements for "prior communication" and "nomination as a whole"; and whether it has assessed if these arrangements are consistent with the relevant provisions of the Basic Law; and

    (c)as many members of CSD have proposed to adopt the approach of "resolving the simple issues before the difficult ones", i.e. issues relating to the selection of CE by universal suffrage, which are comparatively simple, should be resolved first before issues relating to the election of all members of LegCo by universal suffrage should be addressed, will the authorities act in accordance with such a proposal; if not, of the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Constitutional Affairs

*20. Hon Frederick FUNG to ask: (Translation)

Regarding the nuisance caused to neighbours by tenants of public rental housing ("PRH") estates, will the Government inform this Council:
    (a)of the procedure adopted by the Housing Department for handling complaints about the nuisance caused to neighbours by PRH tenants, including whether complaints of different natures are handled in different ways, and whether the complainants are informed in writing of the outcome of the complaints;

    (b)of the number of complaints in this regard received by the Housing Department in the past three years, and among them, the number of cases in which the persons under complaint were suspected to be psychiatric patients and required to be referred to the Social Welfare Department for follow-up actions, and whether the Housing Department will consider recruiting social workers to handle such cases;

    (c)of a breakdown, by PRH estates, of the number of noise nuisance complaints received by the Housing Department since the inclusion, on 1 January this year, of "causing noise nuisance" as a misdeed in respect of which points may be allotted under the Marking Scheme for Estate Management Enforcement in Public Housing Estates ("Marking Scheme"), and the respective numbers of cases in which the persons under complaint were given warning letters and allotted points respectively since the inclusion; and

    (d)whether it will consider including "causing nuisance to neighbours" as a misdeed in respect of which points may be alloted under the Marking Scheme; if not, of the reasons for that?
Public Officer to reply : Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands

*For written reply.

III. Members' Motions

  1. Proposed resolution under the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance

    Hon James TO to move the following motion:

    RESOLVED that in relation to the -

    (a)Fugitive Offenders (Malaysia) (Amendment) Order 2007, published in the Gazette as Legal Notice No. 82 of 2007; and

    (b)Fugitive Offenders (Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism) Order, published in the Gazette as Legal Notice No. 83 of 2007,

    and laid on the table of the Legislative Council on 23 May 2007, the period for repealing an order referred to in section 3(3) of the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance (Cap. 503) be extended under section 3(5) of that Ordinance to the meeting of 11 July 2007.

  2. Proposed resolution under the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance

    Hon Margaret NG to move the following motion:

    RESOLVED that in relation to the Fugitive Offenders (Corruption) Order, published in the Gazette as Legal Notice No. 100 of 2007 and laid on the table of the Legislative Council on 30 May 2007, the period for repealing an order referred to in section 3(3) of the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance (Cap. 503) be extended under section 3(5) of that Ordinance to the first sitting (within the meaning of section 3(16) thereof) of the next session of the Legislative Council.

  3. Policy on nursing manpower

    Dr Hon Joseph LEE Kok-long: (Translation)

    That, despite the increasing demand for health care services in Hong Kong in recent years, the Government has failed to work out a long-term plan for nursing human resources, resulting in a significant shortage of nurses over the years, and the lack of promotion prospects in public hospitals has led to low morale and persistent wastage of nurses; moreover, the Hospital Authority has recently projected that the number of nurses would still fall short of the demand in the coming years; in view of the above factors, this Council is worried that the quality of nursing services in public hospitals will decline and therefore urges the Government to expeditiously implement the following measures to maintain the quality of nursing services in Hong Kong:

    (a)devising a comprehensive and long-term plan for human resources for general and psychiatric nursing services;

    (b)formulating an appropriate manpower ratio between nurses and clients of nursing care;

    (c)allocating more resources to the training of nurses and increasing the places for degree programmes on nursing;

    (d)improving the pay and promotion prospects of nurses in public hospitals to curb the wastage of nurses; and

    (e)facing up to the problem of "de-nursing" and ensuring that nursing services are provided by nurses to clients of nursing care.

    Amendment to motion
    Dr Hon Fernando CHEUNG: (Translation)

    To add "because of the continuous ageing of the population" after "increasing demand for health care services in Hong Kong in recent years"; to add "and it is even more difficult for the social welfare sector to recruit nursing staff due to the implementation of the Lump Sum Grant (LSG) subvention system, thus seriously affecting the quality of elderly and rehabilitation services;" after "the number of nurses would still fall short of the demand in the coming years;"; to add "and in the social welfare sector" after "this Council is worried that the quality of nursing services in public hospitals"; to add "nursing" after "devising a comprehensive and long-term plan for"; to delete "nursing services;" after "human resources for general and psychiatric" and substitute with "services as well as for the social welfare sector, including a comprehensive survey on the manpower demand for nurses; (b) immediately conducting a comprehensive review of the LSG subvention system implemented in the social welfare sector, and ensuring that sufficient nursing staff can be recruited in the market by organizations providing elderly and rehabilitation services with a view to enhancing service quality;"; to delete the original "(b)" and substitute with "(c)"; to add "for public hospitals as well as for elderly and rehabilitation services" after "manpower ratio between nurses and clients of nursing care"; to delete the original "(c)" and substitute with "(d)"; to delete the original "(d)" and substitute with "(e)"; to add "and in the social welfare sector" after "promotion prospects of nurses in public hospitals"; to delete the original "(e)" and substitute with "(f)"; and to add ", in particular the common practice of assigning health workers to undertake certain nursing duties in the social welfare sector," after "facing up to the problem of 'de-nursing' ".

    Public Officer to attend : Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food

  4. Demonstrating the people's power on 1 July

    Hon James TO Kun-sun: (Translation)

    That this Council appeals to all the people of Hong Kong to demonstrate the people's power once again on 1 July this year to fight for the building of a society of democracy, prosperity and social justice for Hong Kong.

    Amendment to motion
    Hon Martin LEE:     (Translation)

    To add ", as the remarks made by Mr WU Bangguo, Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress, at the Seminar in Commemoration of the 10th Anniversary of the Implementation of the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region that 'the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region has as much power as that granted by the Central Authorities' have aroused a high level of concern among the people of Hong Kong," after "That"; and to add ", with a view to defending 'one country, two systems', 'Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong' and 'a high degree of autonomy'" immediately before the full stop.

    Public Officer to attend : Secretary for Constitutional Affairs

Clerk to the Legislative Council