Lai See | Prosecutors' ranks weakened by senior departures

Readers will know that we have recently been fretting about who is to be the next Director of Public Prosecutions. The present incumbent, Kevin Zervos, is expected to resign in the not too distant future to become a high court judge. We have mentioned that a former deputy DPP, Robert Lee Shiu-keung, is one person being considered for the role. But we hear there are others also being considered: Robert Pang Yiu-hung SC, who is with Bernacchi Chambers, Eric Kwok Tung-ming SC, who is with Plowman Chambers, and Joseph Tse Wah-yuen, who is with Denis Chang's Chambers.

Finding candidates from within the prosecutions division may be difficult, since there is a dearth of experienced prosecutors, as the department appears to be having some difficulty in retaining senior people. The latest departure was one of the four deputy DPPs, Louisa Lai Nga-man, who left last month. Of the quartet of deputy DPPs in the department in December 2010, there is now only one still in place.

One of the reasons for the high turnover, we are told, is that the lack of sufficient senior prosecutors means that less experienced prosecutors are taking on work for which they may not be fully prepared. By the same token, there are fewer senior figures for less experienced people to run to for advice. This, we understand, increases pressure on people and has contributed to a decline in morale. People also leave the division to enter private practice, which is frequently more lucrative.

This "hollowing out" of the prosecutions division is not a good thing, given that the legal system is frequently touted as one of Hong Kong's competitive advantages. It's clearly important that the division looks at ways of retaining experienced people, through either extending the retirement age, increasing financial incentives, or both.

We see that Citic Securities has taken an imaginative leap forward with a timely research note on companies that produce mooncakes. This is an elaborate piece of research, in Chinese only, which goes into some detail on more than a dozen of the more popular brands of mooncake, with pictures, notes on flavours and, most importantly, the companies that make them, whether listed or unlisted. The company does not go so far as to make investment recommendations. Readers will be aware that Citic Securities is in the process of acquiring stockbroker CLSA, which has a reputation for producing eye-catching and imaginative research. Do we see the hand of CLSA in this latest mooncake study?