Hong Kong budget 2024-25: sweeteners cut by more than 80%, leaving some families asking where they can find help

Budget commits only HK$11.52 billion to one-off relief measures, down from previous HK$59.38 billion

Government has scrapped consumption voucher scheme, HK$1,000 subsidy for electricity bills and will require students to once again pay university entrance exam fee

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The biggest sweetener missing this year was the consumption voucher scheme. Photo: Eugene Lee

Published: 10:13pm, 28 Feb 2024Updated: 12:41pm, 29 Feb 2024

The value of sweeteners has been cut by more than 80 per cent in Hong Kong’s latest budget, given the whopping deficit of more than HK$100 billion (US$12.78 billion), with no renewal of the consumption voucher scheme and taxpayers given fewer reductions.

Other relief measures that residents enjoyed, including HK$1,000 subsidies for electricity bills, the suspension of the university entrance exam fee and additional tax allowances, were also cut in the 2024-25 budget on Wednesday, which committed only HK$11.52 billion to one-off relief measures, down from the previous HK$59.38 billion.

“I hope people understand we have really tried our very best. We have had a few years of budget deficits,” Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po said, referring to the fourth deficit in five years.

“This year is going to have a deficit again. So there is a certain limitation as to the room within which we can hand out those sweeteners.”

Cherry Chan, mother of two-year-old Yau Yu-chai, said she and her husband, Sunny Yau, were disappointed by the lack of government support in the latest budget Photo: Sun Yeung

But Chan, speaking at a press conference after delivering his budget speech, said the economy had been recovering.