John Tsang's budget most unpopular in more than a decade: poll

Financial Secretary John Tsang Chun-wah's latest budget - featuring a smaller basket of one-off relief measures than in previous years and dire warnings about a future structural deficit - is the most unpopular fiscal blueprint in more than a decade.

That was the finding of a University of Hong Kong poll of about 1,000 people, conducted hours after the speech was delivered on Wednesday. Fewer than a quarter were satisfied and 45 per cent were not - giving the budget a net satisfaction rate of minus 20 percentage points, the lowest since 2003.

In 2003, Antony Leung Kam-chung proposed rises in profits tax, salaries tax and new-vehicles tax, which led to his downfall as he had bought a new car shortly before the announcement.

Asked to rate the budget on a scale of one to 100, respondents gave it a satisfaction rating of 49.8, the lowest since the rating was introduced in 2008.

Yesterday, Chinese University political scientist Ivan Choy Chi-keung said it was unfair to judge Tsang based on the ratings.

"The people expect that when the economy is good, the government should share its [surplus, and] when the economy is bad, the government should relieve the people's difficulties," Choy said. "It isn't healthy … Tsang is trying to turn this around, and it's going to be painful."