Exco approves civil service pay cuts
The Executive Council has endorsed a proposal to cut the pay of university graduates who have joined the civil service since October 1 by about HK$2,000 a month.
Civil servants in 36 ranks will be affected. Their minimum starting salaries will be reduced from HK$21,880 to HK$19,835 a month, saving HK$10 million a year.
About 400 civil servants are recruited to these ranks annually.
Those affected include computer programmers, court interpreters, hospital administrators, speech therapists, assistant information officers and assistant police research officers. Teachers at subsidised schools will also be hit as their pay is linked to that of government schoolteachers.
The Standing Commission on Civil Service Salaries and Conditions of Service made its recommendation based on pay cuts at 112 companies in the 12 months to April last year.
'The revised starting salaries ... will still ... enable the administration to attract quality recruits to join and remain in the civil service,' a spokesman for the Civil Service Bureau said.
The pay cuts require the approval of the Legislative Council's Finance Committee before the summer break in July.
