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Simon Parry

Civil Service Secretary Joseph Wong Wing-ping  is torpedoing an obvious target in his first round of cuts to allowances - an archaic colonial benefit that allows retiring civil servants to sail  into the sunset with their wives on $120,000 cruises.

He also wants to scrap a little-known allowance that enables civil servants to claim a $3,135 grant for  fitting an air conditioner  in their flats - and more  if they have children under 21 live at home.

The sea-passage allowance  permits  a senior retiring civil servant to book a $62,000-a-head first-class cruise from Hong Kong to Southampton.

So far this year, 19 retiring officers and their wives have claimed first-class sea passages, at a total cost to taxpayers of $2.5 million.

It is, the consultation paper points out, 'out of step with present day circumstances' and take-up rates have in the past five years averaged only 38 per cent,  with many swapping the benefit for  direct flights home.

'Apart from the escalating costs, as sailings between Hong Kong and the UK have become fewer, the retiring officers are often unable to find a suitable sailing that takes place before the expiry of their final leave,' the consultation paper says.

The air-conditioning allowance,  introduced in 1973,  is payable to expatriate officers and directorate-level local officers. If an officer has a child at home, he or she can claim up to $6,270 and buy two  units.

The other benefits targeted in the first phase  of the  cuts are hotel subsistence allowances, those for buying furniture and domestic appliances,  and allowances for expatriate officers and their families to visit  home countries.

Police officers opposing the cuts believe the   allowances  were chosen for elimination to minimise opposition and to open the door  to  sweeping cuts in education and housing grants.

The district commander of Wong Tai Sin, Chief Superintendent Ian Seabourne, who is two years from retirement and eligible for the sea passage allowance, described it as  a 'cultural anomaly'.

'Nevertheless I think the government is going down a very dodgy road because it is guaranteed under Article 100 of the Basic Law.  It says simply that your allowance, salaries and benefit can't be less than in 1997.

'Joseph Wong might turn around and say 'Ian Seabourne is entitled to go back on a ship with his wife and it will cost the government $120,000'. That is true.

'But if Mr Wong phoned me up and asked me to give it up, telling me 'this looks ridiculous', I would say 'keep it'. I get seasick anyway.'

Mark Ford-McNicol, head of the Expatriate Inspectors Association, said whatever anyone thought of the benefits, they were allowances guaranteed under Article 100 of the Basic Law  for police who stayed on after the handover.

He cited the description of the allowances in the consultation paper as 'fringe-type benefits' as an example of the government playing the 'spin doctor game' to lessen opposition to a fundamental change in conditions of service.

In its consultation paper, the Civil Service Bureau says that in the first  phase  it is targeting 'allowances that affect relatively fewer civil servants' and hopes to  make the cuts  this year.

The second phase of cuts centring on education and housing allowances, the paper says, are 'likely to have a more extensive impact within the civil service'.

In a letter to the Police Force Council, Mr Wong  wrote: 'We have taken care to strike a balance between the interests of civil servants   . . . and the need to modernise the management of the civil service while achieving savings.'



First wave of civil service cuts targets colonial-era cruise perk