Bar Association raps officials for ‘flawed’ argument, says mainland laws at joint checkpoint will affect all Hongkongers
This is because everyone in city is a potential passenger of the high-speed rail, it argues, rebutting authorities’ claim that legal arrangement will apply only to travellers
All individuals in Hong Kong – not just travellers at the West Kowloon terminus of the cross-border rail link to Guangzhou – would be affected by a controversial arrangement for mainland officials to enforce national laws in part of the station, the city’s Bar Association said on Thursday.
In a statement, the professional organisation of barristers said “everyone is a potential passenger of the high-speed rail” and therefore the government’s efforts to push through a bill on the joint checkpoint plan centred on a “flawed” argument. Authorities had insisted such laws would only apply to travellers in a designated area of the terminus.
“The fact that a law may not have immediate practical consequences for a person unless they step into a particular arena does not mean that the law does not apply to all persons,” the association added.
Hong Kong Bar Association ‘appalled’ by approval of joint checkpoint plan, saying it ‘irreparably’ breaches Basic Law
The Basic Law states no mainland Chinese law shall be applied in the city except for those relating to defence, foreign affairs and “other matters outside the limits” of Hong Kong’s autonomy.
They stressed that Hongkongers should judge the rail link based on the economic benefits it would bring the city, and noted the joint checkpoint would save time and spare travellers from the hassle of going through border inspection twice.
Last December, China’s top legislative body, the National People’s Congress Standing Committee, approved the arrangement following an agreement between Lam and Guangdong provincial governor Ma Xingrui.
The Hong Kong government then gazetted the bill in January, and said it hoped Legco – where pro-establishment lawmakers form the majority – would vet and push through draft legislation by July.
Ongoing row over legality of joint checkpoint plan sees Hong Kong’s ex-justice minister and mainland scholars enter the fray
In its statement on Thursday – its third on the matter in four months – the association said the government’s point that those in the mainland port area were entering another jurisdiction also went against the Basic Law, which states that Hong Kong courts have legal authority over all cases in the city.
It would require “the strongest justifications to oust the jurisdiction of the [Hong Kong] court” from the mainland port area, it noted, and “mere convenience or political expediency” could hardly be used as reasons.
“Nor is there anything to suggest that the economic benefits of the high-speed rail could not be achieved by alternative means that do not contravene the Basic Law, such as an amendment to the Basic Law or an amendment to the boundary of [Hong Kong],” it said, adding that officials had failed to provide “arguable constitutional and legal basis” for the bill.