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Klaudia Lee

New schedule will avoid clashing with CPCC and NPC sessions, says proponent

Hong Kong political parties have urged the government to return the chief executive's policy address to its traditional October date, to keep it in line with the opening of the Legislative Council session.

They have also suggested that the budget should be brought forward from March to February so that it does not clash with the National People's Congress.

This year, for the first time, the policy address was switched to January, and on Monday the government proposed to a Legco panel  to keep this schedule, with the budget in March.

Although two other proposals were discussed at the closed-door meeting,  the government and lawmakers preferred not to change the current financial year and favoured keeping the budget in March.

Committee chairman Tsang Yok-sing said government officials preferred a two-month interval between the policy address and the budget  to improve the efficiency of various departments and bureaus in implementing policies.

But he said many legislators  wanted to revert the policy address date to October. He said he had reflected his colleagues' views to the government and asked officials to consult them before discussing the issue at the next meeting on May 5.

Before the shift to the January schedule, Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa followed the practice of the colonial governors of delivering his annual policy speech in the past five years in early October, when Legco begins its session.

Committee deputy chairman Margaret Ng Ngoi-yee, who represents the legal sector, said:  'The policy address should match the commencement of the new Legislative Council. Every country in the world follows this practice.'

Echoing her views, Democratic Party legislator Fred Li Wah-ming, who is one of the committee members, said a vacuum would result as newly elected legislators after the 2004 Legco election would lack a clear policy initiative for discussion and law enactment.

Liberal Party chairman James Tien Pei-chun also said the address date should be kept in October to match the new legislative year.

Mr Tien suggested the budget be delivered in February instead of March so that people could pay equal attention to both the budget and the Chinese People's Consultative Conference and the NPC, which are all held in March.



Legislators want policy speech in October, the budget in February