It was long. It was dull. But at least this year he tried. Mr Tung finally took his aides' advice and kept his speech under two hours - and managed to read it without looking bored. But while the use of an autocue helped him shed the robotic appearance of previous years, the delivery fell well short of being a public relations triumph. 'A dull presentation can wreck a good speech, and a good presentation can improve a dull speech, but with a dull presentation and a dull speech, it's pretty difficult to jazz that up,' PR expert Martin Spurrier said. After criticism last year of the longest policy speech on record - a tedious two hours and 22 minutes - Mr Tung slashed this year's address to a relatively brief hour and three-quarters. And, for the first time, he opted to read from teleprompters either side of the lectern rather than a book, allowing him to shed his reading glasses and appear to make eye contact with people in the chamber. Observers said such attention to detail made this address Mr Tung's best yet - but it was still too long and too bland. 'It was 30 per cent less time and, absolutely, the shorter the better,' said Mr Spurrier, chief executive of Ludgate Asia. 'But there was no attempt to lighten it or humanise it. I recall a State of the Nation address by [President Bill] Clinton after the Gulf War. In thanking the soldiers he actually used the names of two or three ordinary GI Joes and talked a little about their families. 'There's no reason why that kind of creativity can't be injected here. Mr Tung was talking about poverty but there was no mention of a human being. He tried to use some body language but he was very mechanical really.' But Mr Spurrier said opting for the autocue was 'encouraging' and that scrapping Mr Tung's spectacles had worked well. 'His glasses were always terrible - they used to reflect all the time. [Going without glasses] is just a basic part of presentation training, you must establish eye contact,' he said. 'And using a teleprompter was absolutely right. There are 100 people in the house and there are, theoretically, six million people watching it and they should cater for the six million.' Assistant Professor Ma Ngok, of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology's social science division, agreed that the speech was better this year but still lacked inspiration. 'It's an improvement . . . it shows he's willing to improve himself on the PR side,' he said. 'A shorter speech helps, but there weren't many exciting things in it and if there's nothing exciting, shorter's better, but a lot of it was still unnecessary.' He said the address included too much self-congratulation on the Government's past achievements to sit well with average residents. 'It seems the Chief Executive is trying to paint a rosier picture than what most Hong Kong people are feeling - that things aren't so bad. But in the end I don't think that's an accurate description of what people, especially the lower classes, feel,' he said. Graphic: HEAD12GET
