The government would not make the rich poorer so as to narrow the wealth gap, chief executive-elect Leung Chun-ying said yesterday as he named the members of a committee to revive a commission to tackle poverty.
'I have always thought that the problem in Hong Kong is poverty,' Leung said. 'But instead of narrowing the gap, what I'm concerned about is how to raise the income of the poor.
'The issue is not to lower the income levels and assets of the wealthy, but to cater for the needs of the grassroots through welfare services.'
Leung was speaking a day after government statistics revealed that the city's wealth gap had reached a 30-year high, with the Gini coefficient - a globally recognised measure of inequality - reaching 0.537 based on income data collected last year.
Zero on the Gini coefficient scale means perfect equality. One means total inequality.
After taking into account the effects of taxation and welfare benefits provided to the poor, the coefficient, at 0.475, remains too high, welfare groups say.