You may ask, in the face of sizeable deficits, can we afford all these projects? Let me tell you, after detailed study and analysis, we are confident that the deficit will be resolved in the next few years, and sufficient resources will be available to bring all these projects to fruition. - Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa
WELL, MR TUNG, that is indeed the question I ask about your HK$600-billion expenditure programme and, what is more, I think I shall call your bluff.
Show me. If you really have done detailed study and analysis to prove that you can spend all this and still resolve your deficit over the next few years, then let us see this work. I say it is all just numbers spun out of hope and thin air to match expenditure that has spun out of control.
Go on, sir. Your cards on the table, please. Let us look at just one aspect. The wild card in the Government's hand is land sales revenue. Mr Tung can smooth out his capital expenditure from year to year but capital revenue is hugely volatile. For instance, he can expect HK$15 billion from land sales this fiscal year if he is lucky. Four years ago it was HK$66 billion.
So right away he is dealing with one big uncertainty that can mock all detailed study and analysis.
Government projections on land sales have routinely been way off the mark.
Now of course you can say that a low figure this year is only to be expected as the property market is down. It is reasonable to assume that the market will improve within a year or two and land sales revenue rise.
