A survey next month to establish how many children of permanent residents might arrive from the mainland would not provide an accurate picture, a statistician has admitted. Government officials need to assess the number of potential new arrivals in the wake of the court ruling, to decide what services will be needed. Survey takers are to go to 20,000 randomly selected homes to ask residents if they have any children on the mainland, but people may be too embarrassed to admit they have mistresses or illegitimate children, said a staff member of the Census and Statistics Department, which will conduct the poll from March to May. 'If their wife is at home at the time, they would be especially unwilling to tell us about children they had by their mistress,' the staff member said. 'Even if their wife is not home, some people would be reluctant to tell us about the secret side of their life.' While some children are born to married couples, many are believed to be born to Hong Kong men and their mistresses. Information such as the offspring's age, education level and skills is necessary to ensure social and government services can cope with the immigrants. At present, the Government does not know how many such children exist. The last survey of this type was taken in late 1995. It found there were 162,000 children of Hong Kong residents who married on the mainland. Including children born out of wedlock, the actual number is expected to be closer to 320,000, with 220,000 offspring aged 20 or older. Survey results are expected to be available by August.
