Minutes of the 7th Meeting ofFinance Committee (2018-19)

Central and Western District Council

Date : 11 April 2019 (Thursday)Time : 2:30 pmVenue : Conference Room

14/F, Harbour Building38 Pier Road, Central, Hong Kong

Present:ChairmanMr LEE Chi-hang, Sidney, MH*

Vice-chairmanMr CHEUNG Kwok-kwan, JP*

MembersMr CHAN Chit-kwai, Stephen, BBS, JP (2:40 pm – 5:42 pm)Mr CHAN Choi-hi, MH, JP (2:40 pm – end of the meeting)Mr CHAN Hok-fung, MH, JP*Ms CHENG Lai-king (2:46 pm – 5:40 pm)Mr HUI Chi-fung*

Mr KAM Nai-wai, MH (2:40 pm – 3:32 pm)Miss LO Yee-hang, MH (start of the meeting – 5:16 pm)Mr NG Siu-hong*Ms NG Hoi-yan, Bonnie (start of the meeting – 5:42 pm)Mr YEUNG Hoi-wing*Mr YEUNG Hok-ming*Mr YIP Wing-shing, SBS, MH, JP*Mr YOUNG Chit-on, Jeremy (start of the meeting – 4:19 pm)

Remarks: * Members who attended the whole meeting( ) Time of attendance of Members

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In Attendance:Mrs WONG HO Wing-sze,

Susanne, JPDistrict Officer (Central and Western)

Ms YEUNG Wing-shan, Grace Senior Executive Officer (District Council), Central and Western District Office

Ms LEE Siu-ping, Stephanie Liaison Officer I (District Facilities & Community Involvement), Central and Western District Office

Ms LUI Yee-ting, Joey Executive Assistant (District Council) 4, Central and Western District Office

Ms AU-YEUNG Cheuk-chi Social worker, Youth Employment Resource Centre, Hong Kong Y.W.C.A

Ms HUNG Ngai Unit-in-charge (Service), Hong Kong Y.W.C.A Western Integrated Social Service Centre

Mr HAU Kwun-lam Social Worker, Hong Kong Young Women’s Christian Association Kwun Lung Lau Community Work Office

Ms CHIU Wah-kuen President, Hong Kong Central and Western District Woman Association

Ms CHAN Suk-fan, Bianca Deputy District Leisure Manager (District Support) Central & Western, Leisure and Cultural Services Department

Mr KAM Man-kit Chairman, Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts

Mr LEUNG Kam-tong Performing Arts Group Vice Chairman, Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts

Ms SIN Tsui-mei Officer, Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts

Mr LAM Chung-ming Social Worker, St. James Settlement Central & Western District Elderly Community Centre

Ms CHEUNG Hoi-wah Manager, St. James Settlement Central & Western District Elderly Community Centre

Mr FU Wai-hon Social Work Assistant, Caritas Jockey Club Integrated Service for Young People – Shek Tong Tsui

Mr LIU Chi-hong Family Social Worker, Grace & Joy Integrated Family Service Centre, The Hong Kong Catholic Marriage Advisory Council

Ms Rita LAI Administrative Executive, Tung Sin TanMs Ruby TANG Project Coordinator, Tung Sin Tan

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Mr LO Kai-hang Education Officer, Plastic Oceans LimitedMs LAM Lun-wai Welfare Worker, Caritas Community Centre – Caine

RoadMr LEUNG Chung-yin Welfare Worker, Caritas Community Centre – Caine

RoadMs LAI Siu-ching Group Leader, Caritas Community Centre – Caine RoadMs HON Wai-fan Senior Communication/Project Officer, St. Barnabas’

Society and HomeMs Margaret LIU Designated Event-in-charge, Friends of Mount Davis

Association LimitedMr KWOK Kam-wing Organising Committee Member, Friends of Mount

Davis Association LimitedMs LUK Pui-ling, Susanna Deputy Director, The Hong Kong Road Safety

AssociationMs SOONG Yuen-shan Project Director, The Association of Chinese Culture of

Hong KongMs Julie YIU President, Junior Chamber International BauhiniaMs Beatrix TSANG Community Development Director, Junior Chamber

International Bauhinia

Secretary:Ms YIP Wing-yan, Sonia Executive Officer (District Council) 1, Central and

Western District Office

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The Chairman welcomed all to the meeting.

Item 1: Adoption of the Agenda

2. The agenda of the meeting was adopted.

Item 2: Confirmation of the Minutes of the 6th Finance Committee Meeting in 2018-19

3. The minutes of the 6th Finance Committee (FC) meeting in 2018-19 were confirmed by the Committee.

Item 3: DC Funds Financial Report (2018-19) (C&W FC Paper No. 35/2019 to 36/2019)

4. The Home Affairs Department (HAD) had allocated $19,440,000 to the Central and Western District Council (C&WDC) in the year 2018/19 for organising community involvement (CI) projects. As at 31 March 2019, after deducting a total of $771,697 to be carried forward to the year 2019/20, the C&WDC had endorsed $ 22,845,824.25 for CI projects, which accounted for 117.52 % of the $19,440,000 allocated by the HAD. The actual expenditure amounted to $ 19,337,148.41 , accounting for 99.47 % of the allocated funding.

5. The Chairman reported that since the last meeting, the FC had endorsed a total of 4 funding application for CI projects by circulation of paper. For details, please refer to Paper No. 36/2019.

Item 4: Proposal on DC Funds Allocation (2019-20) (C&W FC Paper No. 40/2019)

6. The Chairman said that as stated in the HAD’s notification previously received by the Secretariat, a total amount of $19,440,000 would be allocated to the C&WDC in the year 2019/20 for organising CI projects. According to the Manual on the Use of District Council (DC) Funds issued by the HAD (the Manual), in the final year of the DC term, 5% to 10% of the provision for the DCs should be reserved for use on projects initiated by the DC of the new term in the first three months of office from 1 January to 31 March 2020. Taking into account the over-allocation

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at 120% for the financial year 2018/19, it was proposed that the allocation amount for the financial year 2019/20 be maintained at 120%.

7. For the DC of the last term, 5% of the provision for the DC had been reserved for use on projects initiated by the DC of the new term. If the practice of the last term was to be adopted, the maximum amount of funding that could be allocated this year would be $22,161,600 (i.e. $19,440,000 x 120% x 95%). At the time the Secretariat prepared the budget, it needed to reserve funds for implementing the regular activities organised each year and for organising district festival activities. Therefore, if there was an over-allocation at 114% (i.e. 95% of the over-allocation at 120%), the allocation for most committees, working groups, local organisations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) would be reduced by about 11% as compared with last year.

8. The Chairman briefed Members on the proposals that had been approved by the FC as follows:

- The allocation reserved for the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD) ($7,198,636) would be decreased by $362 as compared with last year.

- Recruitment of dedicated officers ($2,495,052): In 2019-20, 7 Executive Assistants, 1 Project Co-ordinator and 1 Project Assistant would be recruited. Owing to pay adjustment, the allocation would be increased by $107,532 as compared with last year.

9. It was proposed to reserve funds for organising special activities this year as follows:- Central and Western District Festival: An allocation of $595,126 was reserved for

the Central and Western District Festival Organizing Committee for taking forward district festival activities. An allocation of $302,634 was also reserved for recruitment of Executive Assistant for assisting in organising the activities;

- District Study: An allocation of $112,500 was reserved for settling the remaining payment of the “Traffic Study: To Explore Ways to Solve the Problem of Insufficient Parking Spaces”. An allocation of $400,000 was also reserved for settling the remaining payment of the “Environmental Hygiene Study: Study on Frequent Appearance of Wild Pigs in the Central and Western District at Night Searching for Food and Causing Nuisance to Pedestrians”.

10. Allocation for the following items would be decreased by 11%:- National Day celebration activities- New Year’s Eve activities- Working Group on Concern Over Building Management in the Central &

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Western District- Working Group on Concern over the Development of the Central Police Station

Compound and Former Police Married Quarters- Working Group on Mid-levels Escalators in the Central & Western District

(Working Group on Escalators)- For application by other local organisations (arts and cultural activities)- Culture in the District- Working Group on Elderly Service- Anti-mosquito and year-end cleaning activities- Working Group on Environmental Improvement, Greening and Beautification

Works in C&W District- Concern Group on the Development of Markets in the Central and Western

District- Central and Western District Recreation and Sports Association- Central and Western District Youth Programme Committee - The Council of Central & Western District School Heads- Central and Western District Fire Safety Committee- Central and Western District Fight Crime Committee- Central and Western District Committee on Promotion of Information

Technology - Central and Western District Co-ordinating Committee on New Arrival Services- Central and Western District Road Safety Campaign Committee- Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts- For application by other local organisations

11. Allocation for the following items would be decreased by more than 11%:- DC publicity campaigns and promoting tourism in the Central and Western

District ($400,000): The allocation would be decreased by $150,000 as compared with last year because an item of allocation was proposed for recruiting Executive Assistant for organising district festival activities this year;

- Working Group on the Central & Western District Harbourfront ($100,000): The allocation would be decreased by $58,000 as compared with last year, and $100,000 was the actual amount of expenditure last year;

- For application by other local organisations (civic education activities) ($30,000): The allocation would be decreased by $75,000 as compared with last year, and the total amount of allocation approved last year was about $30,000;

- Chung Wan and Mid-levels Area Committee ($100,000);- Sheung Wan and Sai Ying Pun Area Committee ($100,000);

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- Kennedy Town and Shek Tong Tsui Area Committee ($100,000);- The allocation for each of the three area committees (ACs) would be decreased by

$65,000 as compared with last year. As the ACs would take up some district festival activities and some of the activities would be jointly organised by the ACs this year, there was a considerable decrease in the total allocation.

12. Allocation for the following items would be decreased by less than 11% or would remain unchanged:

- Recruitment activities ($147,000): A total allocation of $160,000 was reserved for recruitment activities last year, but the actual amount of allocation approved was only $147,000, which might be the lowest cost for the item according to the past experience.

- Central and Western District Outdoor Educational Programme ($300,000): As the activity was well received by students in the district, it was proposed that the amount of allocation should remain unchanged.

- Spring Cantonese Opera Show ($250,000): As the activity was welcomed by residents in the district, it was proposed that the amount of allocation should remain unchanged.

- Festive Lantern Decoration in Central and Western District (2019/2020) ($700,000): The amount of allocation was the same as that of last year. In the light of past experience, the estimates of the festive lantern decoration had been reduced as far as possible in the tendering exercise. As estimated, the amount might be the lowest cost for the item.

- Festive lighting ($440,000): The amount of allocation was the same as that of last year. As estimated, the amount might be the lowest cost for the item in the light of past experience.

13. Allocation for the following items would be increased:- Steering Committee on Healthy City in the Central and Western District (Steering

Committee) ($495,730): The allocation would be increased by $395,730 as compared with last year for implementing the activities of the Central and Western District Health Festival (the expenditure of which was sponsored by the Hong Kong Jockey Club last year). The total allocation for the Steering Committee would be decreased by 11% as compared with the year 2017/18.

14. One new item would be added in 2019/20:- Printing of C&WDC report: An allocation of $90,000 was reserved for printing

the C&WDC report of the current term.7

15. Four items would be deleted in 2019/20:- Central and Western District Working Group for the 7th Hong Kong Games: The

allocation was approved in 2018/19;- New service programmes in the district: In addition to the tight budget this year,

some NGOs were still implementing the programmes approved in 2018/19 at present. Therefore, allocation for implementing additional new service programmes was not recommended;

- Printing of periodicals of the C&WDC: The work of the C&WDC would be publicised through production of a C&WDC report this year.

- Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts (Central and Western District Culture and Art Festival): The activity was completed in 2018/19.

16. The FC had endorsed to carry forward an allocation of $2,652,621.1 to this financial year from the last one.

17. Mr HUI Chi-fung asked whether Paper No. 40/2019 was sent to Members only on the day before the meeting, and asked why it was so.

18. The Chairman replied that the paper was sent to Members on the day before the meeting. Since the paper was not submitted by government departments or Members, the Central and Western District Council Standing Orders (Standing Orders) did not specify the time for issuing such paper. The Secretariat was required to ensure that all figures provided in the proposal on DC funds allocation were accurate before sending the paper to Members. The Chairman apologised for not having given sufficient time to Members for thinking over the contents of the paper.

19. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that, according to the Chairman, the paper was neither a government paper nor a paper submitted by Members. However, it was stated at the end of the paper that it was submitted by the C&WDC Secretariat. He enquired about the nature of the paper.

20. The Chairman replied that the Secretariat’s paper was an internal paper of the DC.

21. Mr HUI pointed out that Members could not move a motion regarding this paper if it was not a government paper.

22. The Chairman said that Members needed not move a motion for the paper since the key point was to discuss on how to allocate the DC funds.

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23. Mr HUI enquired whether the Secretariat had sent papers regarding proposal on DC funds allocation only shortly before meetings in the past.

24. The Chairman replied that the relevant record was not available at hand, but believed that the Secretariat had sent the papers to Members for reference as quickly as possible subsequent to the settlement of accounts.

25. Mr KAM Nai-wai said that he was unaware of the issuing time of the paper, but hoped that the Chairman would provide adequate time for Members to study papers and raise comments for the sake of showing respect to the DC. Mr KAM understood that an informal meeting on the proposal on DC funds allocation was held earlier, but it was not a public meeting, so the public did not have adequate time to learn the contents of the paper. Mr KAM said that, except in emergencies, Members might not have adequate time to read a paper in only one day. Furthermore, according to his understanding, Members might move motions on the proposed allocation for DC funds, such as rejecting the allocation of funds to an organisation.

26. Mr HUI wanted to understand why the paper was issued only one day before the meeting. Mr HUI continued that some discrepancies between a proposal on DC funds allocation discussed at an informal meeting and that submitted for discussion at the concerned FC meeting had been found in the past. He opined that it was necessary for Members to have enough time to read the paper to identify if there were any amendments, and that the arrangement for sending the paper to Members only one day before the meeting was unreasonable. Regarding the nature of the paper concerned, Mr HUI thought that “internal paper of the DC” was not mentioned in the Standing Orders. If the paper was an “internal paper of the DC”, he considered it necessary to discuss at the Ad-hoc Working Group on Review of Standing Orders of Central and Western District Council (Ad-hoc Working Group) whether this kind of paper was to be governed by the Standing Orders, and whether Members could move a motion regarding such paper. According to Order 24 of the Standing Orders, Mr HUI requested to adjourn discussion on the paper.

27. Mr CHAN Hok-fung said that it was a general practice for the DC to convene an informal meeting prior to the formal discussion on DC funds allocation at a FC meeting. During the concerned informal meeting, most Members present including Mr HUI Chi-fung had raised views on the proposal on DC funds allocation. To his understanding, the paper was issued to Members just before the meeting because the Secretariat had to make accurate calculation of the funding to be carried forward which could only be confirmed in late March. If Members held that discussion on the paper concerned could not be carried on at the meeting, discussion on all funding applications submitted to the meeting would be required to adjourn as well.

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28. Mrs WONG HO Wing-sze , District Officer (Central and Western), agreed to Mr KAM Nai-wai’s views. She apologised for not giving adequate time to Members for reading the paper because the Secretariat issued the paper just on the day before the meeting. Mrs WONG said that the paper under discussion was a proposal on DC funds allocation, aiming to prepare a budget for individual committees or organisations. After endorsing the budget, Members could process individual applications, and the actual amount of allocation endorsed might be different from the original estimate of each application. Mrs WONG hoped Members would understand that when the Secretariat prepared the budget, the proposed ratio of allocation among various items was largely the same as that in the previous year. As the amount of provision available for allocation this year was less than that in last year, the allocation earmarked for most items had been reduced in the same proportion. Mrs WONG continued that the proposal on DC funds allocation set out in the paper submitted for discussion at the meeting was identical to the proposal discussed at the informal meeting held on 29 March 2019, because the Secretariat had made no amendments. Moreover, as the meeting date was long scheduled and the last financial year had just closed at the end of March, the Secretariat had tried its best to finalise the accounts of the last financial year within the shortest time, aiming to have this funding proposal endorsed at the meeting and facilitate various organisations in the district to submit funding applications for implementing activities. In the event that the allocation proposal was not endorsed in April, the funding applications submitted by organisations in the district might need to await discussion until the FC meeting to be held on 20 June 2019. Also, as clarified by Mrs WONG, the Standing Orders did not stipulate that Members could not move a motion for a paper submitted by the Secretariat. However, as in the past, Members might directly decide whether a paper prepared by the Secretariat for the DC was to be endorsed, and need not make a decision by moving a motion.

29. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai said that in the past, an accurate budget for the next year could only be drawn up after finalising the accounts of the entire financial year in late March. Moreover, the HAD would not inform the DCs of their respective provisions in the following year prematurely before the end of financial year. Mr CHAN understood that it was difficult for the Secretariat to prepare an accurate budget under manpower constraint and tight time frame. He agreed that the DC’s budget had to be released for public information. If Mr HUI or other Members had any queries about the budget, they could certainly raise them any time, and the Committee might make amendments to the budget as appropriate. Mr CHAN did not agree with Mr HUI’s request for adjourning the discussion, and believed that the funding applications should be considered at the meeting.

30. Mr YIP Wing-shing said that discussion on the proposal on DC funds allocation was carried out in line with the previous practice. As this year was the final year of the current term of DC,

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there was a pressing need for the Secretariat to accurately prepare the budget and calculate the amount to be carried forward from the last financial year to facilitate the handover to the new term of DC. Regarding the deadline for submission of paper by the Secretariat, Mr YIP proposed to discuss the issue by the Ad-hoc Working Group. He considered that processing of the funding applications should be continued at the meeting because internal problems of the Committee should not adversely affect the applicants.

31. Mr KAM Nai-wai opined that as Members had held preliminary discussion on the funding proposal previously, it might not cause any serious problems to the discussion at the meeting even if the re-sent paper had reached Members’ hands only on the day before the meeting. However, as the DC was under public scrutiny, he hoped that the arrangement could be considered from a public perspective. Mr KAM continued to say that he hoped papers concerning proposal on DC funds allocation could be issued one week before the meeting in accordance with normal procedures, allowing the public adequate time to read the papers. If some calculations were not ready prior to the meeting, e.g. the amount to be carried forward could only be confirmed on 31 March, then the Secretariat could provide the relevant figures later.

32. Mr HUI Chi-fung agreed with Mrs WONG in saying that the paper was an allocation proposal while the actual amount granted for applications would be considered case by case . However, he thought that if Members did not have the opportunity to discuss the budget of various items set out in the proposal on DC funds allocation, the so-called vetting of applications on a case-by-case basis might not exist. It was because, for instance, if no Members recommended addition of funding items, there would be no applications submitted under such items in future. Secondly, Mr HUI hoped that other Members would not reverse the cause and effect relationship by saying that the failure of endorsing the proposal on DC funds allocation at the meeting would hold back the funding applications of all organisations for implementing activities. As he thought, the problem lied in the belated dispatch of the paper by the Secretariat, and the Secretariat or the Central and Western District Office (C&WDO) still did not explain about this. Mr HUI held that there was something wrong with the procedures for meetings of the Committee. Therefore, Members who wanted to carefully read the paper should not be blamed for impeding the applicants from applying for the DC funds. Mr HUI said that some Members seemed to be acting like “rubber stamps” in the past and endorsed applications without seriously reading the meeting papers. He had strong views on the proposal on DC funds allocation, which had been clearly expressed at the informal meeting. Mr HUI questioned why early dispatch of the paper was not arranged if it was identical to the version provided at the informal meeting. To uphold the dignity of the Committee and facilitate close monitoring of the Government by the public, Mr HUI requested to adjourn discussion of the paper again according to Order 24 of the Standing Orders, and proposed to hold a special meeting next week for considering all applications that had been

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submitted to the FC.

33. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming opined that Members should be able to read a paper with one day’s time. Mr YEUNG indicated that a Member alleged to have read the paper at another meeting, but what he said had exposed that he did not seriously read the paper.

34. Mr NG Siu-hong asked Mrs WONG about her views on whether papers submitted by the Secretariat of the C&WDC were government papers. Mr NG said that Members did not have adequate time to move a motion, amended motion and re-amended motion for the paper which was sent only on the day before the meeting. Moreover, Mr NG pointed out that there were discrepancies between the proposal on DC funds allocation and Mrs WONG’s statement. For example, she said the allocation for all items would be reduced by 11% as compared with last year, but the proposed allocation for civic education activities this year saw a reduction of almost 70% actually.

35. The Vice-chairman said the statement just made by Mr NG Siu-hong revealed that he had carefully read the paper, and believed that Mr NG could make a decision on the paper at the meeting.

36. The Chairman said that the DC had held an informal meeting on 29 March 2019. The chairmen and the vice-chairmen of all committees, and the chairmen of all working groups were invited to attend the meeting. Mr NG Siu-hong and Mr HUI Chi-fung had also attended the meeting that day. No amendments had been made to the paper submitted for discussion at the informal meeting afterwards, and the same paper was re-submitted to the FC meeting for discussion.

37. Mr HUI Chi-fung repeatedly requested the Chairman to clarify that he had proposed amendments to the proposal on DC funds allocation at the informal meeting.

38. The Chairman requested Mr HUI to let him continue his speech, and would deal with the issue raised by Mr HUI in due course. The Chairman went on to say that as no amendments had been made to the proposal on DC funds allocation between the informal meeting and the FC meeting, Members should have 14 days or so to read the proposal, which was simply a budget to allocate the provision available to the DC this financial year to various areas and served as a reference for endorsing funding applications in future. In response to Mr NG Siu-hong’s enquiry about the nature of the paper, the Chairman said he had already pointed out at the beginning of the discussion that the paper was prepared by the Secretariat and submitted by the DC, it was not a government paper because no government departments were involved, and it was also not a

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discussion paper submitted by Members. Mrs WONG had also pointed out a moment ago that Members might not need to deal with the paper by way of moving a motion, and the Chairman welcomed Members to comment on the paper. The Chairman remarked that it was the right time to discuss the paper at the meeting, and that the paper would not be endorsed without discussion. In case Members had any proposed amendments, they might put them forward at the meeting and, with Members’ consent, the Secretariat might make further amendment to the paper and provided Members with the amended version after the meeting. The Chairman believed that it would be quicker for Members to directly raise their views at the meeting than to move a motion, amended motion or re-amended motion. The Chairman responded to Mr HUI Chi-fung’s request by pointing out that Mr HUI had given various comments at the informal meeting indeed, and Mr HUI had also indicated that he would give the same comments again at the formal meeting, that is, the current FC meeting. Besides, the Chairman agreed to Mr KAM Nai-wai in that the time for the public to read the paper would be the longer the better. However, as Mrs WONG had just explained, the Secretariat wanted to provide accurate figures before sending the paper, and that was why the paper was sent slightly later than usual. In the light of the experience accumulated over the years, transfer of funds might be arranged with the consent of the FC Members if there was residual funding or inadequate funding for individual projects. This paper served as a budget for reference, facilitating various organisations to know about the resources earmarked for various areas by the DC this year and aiding them to submit funding applications. The Chairman cited civic education activities as an example, saying that an amount of $100,000 was reserved for application by organisations for organising such activities in the past, but the actual amount approved was about $30,000 only. If more organisations planned to submit funding applications for organising civic education activities this year, the FC might consider transferring funds from other items where appropriate. If the allocation proposal was endorsed at the meeting, any comments given by the public via Members or directly to the DC could still be discussed at the FC meetings to be held.

39. Mr HUI Chi-fung pointed out that an informal meeting was held on 29 March 2019 and no formal paper was tabled at the meeting. Only a proposal on DC funds allocation prepared by the Secretariat or the Chairman was provided for consulting Members. Mr HUI said that he had strong views on the proposed allocation, and had indicated at the informal meeting that he would raise the views again at the meeting. He only received an informal paper on 29 March 2019, and Members had no idea of whether any amendments or minor adjustments had been incorporated in the final version of the paper submitted to the FC meeting after they had raised their views. For this reason, Members needed some time to read the papers. Moreover, meeting papers were not only provided for Members’ perusal but also for public access. In the case of any comments given by residents regarding any part of the budget, it was his responsibility to reflect such comments to the Committee. As the Secretariat uploaded the paper to the website only after 4:00

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pm on the day before the meeting, the period available for public access to the paper was less than 24 hours. It seemed that the DC was regarded as a “rubber stamp”. Mr HUI clarified that it was the Chairman’s personal view that the paper concerned was not a government paper. According to Mrs WONG, the Standing Orders did not provide that Members could not move a motion about this paper. He opined that the details could be discussed at the Ad-hoc Working Group. Mr HUI held that he was a representative of the public, and that it was necessary to clearly and specifically put the DC’s standpoints to record in certain instances. Regarding the paper concerned, Mr HUI had strong views on the necessity of dealing with the issue by way of motion. It was simply the Chairman’s personal view of having no need to move a motion. Mr HUI requested to adjourn discussion of the paper again according to Order 24 of the Standing Orders, and proposed to convene a special meeting next week for considering all applications that had been submitted to the FC, allowing the public to have time to give comments and move motions.

40. The Chairman requested Mr HUI Chi-fung to repeat his views raised at the informal meeting held on 29 March.

41. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that if the Chairman decided to continue discussion on the paper, he would raise all his views again.

42. Mr NG Siu-hong requested Mrs WONG to respond whether the paper was a discussion paper submitted by the Government. Moreover, he understood that the funding granted for civic education activities was about $30,000 only last year, but an amount of $80,000 was granted the year before last. Mr NG considered it unreasonable for the DC to substantially reduce the allocation for civic education activities to $30,000 before it had carefully considered its position to encourage civic education and had conducted a review to see if there was any inadequacy with the publicity.

43. The Chairman understood that Mr NG Siu-hong considered the allocation for civic education activities inadequate, and invited Mr NG to put forward his expected increase in allocation.

44. Mr NG Siu-hong said that reduction in allocation for civic education activities should align with that of other items, and that a reduction of 11% for the concerned allocation was recommended.

45. Mr HUI Chi-fung held that as the Chairman had not addressed the point of order, formal discussion was yet to commence.

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46. The Vice-chairman said that views just raised by Members began to sound repetitive. He suggested that if a Member repeated his/her points, the Chairman should discontinue his/her speech to avoid wasting the time of the Committee. The Vice-chairman said that there was no progress for the discussion in the past hour. Since Mr HUI requested the Chairman to deal with the point of order he mentioned, the Vice-chairman proposed that the Chairman should deal with it first so that Members could start the formal discussion as soon as possible.

47. Mrs WONG said that the paper concerned was the Secretariat’s paper, and the Secretariat submitted the paper for the purpose of providing service to the DC and maintaining the operation of the DC. The Standing Orders did not preclude the moving of motions for this kind of paper, but in practice no such motions were moved in the past because Members could agree, object or make amendments to the papers at any time. If some Members wanted to stipulate that they could move motions for this kind of paper, they might propose to have an in-depth discussion by the Ad-hoc Working Group. In response to Mr NG Siu-hong’s statement, Mrs WONG explained that what she had just mentioned was the broad direction of the Secretariat when preparing the budget. Precisely speaking, an overall reduction of 11% would be applied to the allocation of all items first, and further increase or decrease in funds allocation for individual items would be made where necessary. When the Chairman introduced the paper, he had also mentioned about the details and reasons regarding some items for which the allocations were not reduced by 11%. Mrs WONG reiterated that the DC was endorsing the estimated budget of funds allocation at present rather than the actual allocation for various items. In the past, some activities endorsed by the FC subsequently needed additional funding while some items had surplus funding, and Members would transfer the funds as appropriate. Therefore, this paper aimed to provide a budget for the DC funds allocations. Mrs WONG apologised again for the arrangement regarding issuance of the paper. She explained that the Secretariat wanted to accurately calculate the amount of funds to be carried forward to the following year, because the difference in the amount handled might vary from tens of thousands of dollars to $100,000 when approaching the end of a financial year. Mrs WONG undertook that papers prepared by the Secretariat would be issued as early as possible in future, such as sending the paper one week before the meeting. The Secretariat would also consider Mr KAM’s proposal and prepare a version which contained rough figures for Members’ reference first, so that Members would have adequate time to read the paper. Furthermore, she would consider postponing the date of the FC meeting in each year so as to avoid scheduling meeting in early April.

48. The Chairman wanted to deal with the issue of whether discussion on the paper was to be continued. He pointed out that the next FC meeting would be held on 20 June 2019, unless Members decided to hold a special meeting to consider the applications. The Chairman thought that a special meeting, if convened, could be held in two weeks so that Members and the public

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could have adequate time to study the paper. In the meantime, if it was decided to adjourn discussion on the paper at the meeting, discussion on funding applications could not proceed as the budget could not be determined.

49. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that he had just proposed to convene a special meeting in one week.

50. The Chairman said that the views raised by Mr HUI would be put to record. The Chairman invited Members to indicate whether they agreed to adjourn discussion of the paper.

51. With four affirmative votes (Mr HUI Chi-fung, Ms NG Hoi-yan, Mr NG Siu-hong, Mr KAM Nai-wai) and eleven dissenting votes (Mr CHAN Chit-kwai, Mr CHAN Choi-hi, Mr CHAN Hok-fung, Ms CHENG Lai-king, Mr CHEUNG Kwok-kwan, Mr LEE Chi-hang, Miss LO Yee-hang, Mr YEUNG Hoi-wing, Mr YEUNG Hok-ming, Mr YIP Wing-shing, Mr YOUNG Chit-on), the Committee decided against adjournment of discussion on the paper “Proposal on DC Funds Allocation” (C&W FC Paper No. 40/2019).

52. The Chairman declared to continue discussion on the paper concerned, and invited Members to give comments.

53. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai did not agree with Mrs WONG’s proposal of postponing the FC meeting to be held in April in future, because many NGOs had reflected to him that they did not have adequate time to organise activities due to the DC’s belated granting of funds. He considered that the practice of budgeting for funds allocation by way of negotiation had been effective over the years. Mr CHAN responded to Mr NG Siu-hong by stating that he, being the Chairman of the Culture, Leisure and Social Affairs Committee (CLSAC), understood the situation on funding applications for organising civic education activities. Having learnt that the response from the organisations was not encouraging, he had addressed the problem properly by inviting the organisations again to apply for the funding, but the result was still unsatisfactory with only a few applications received. He thought that if the response was not satisfactory, the allocation for civic education activities could be reduced first. If more applications were received in future, proposed transfer of funds might be submitted to the FC for consideration.

54. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming said that he had no particular views on the funding allocation. However, he believed that if some Members were opposed to the funding allocation, they might submit a paper requesting for rejecting the entire proposal on DC funds allocation, or requesting for voting by Members. Mr YEUNG continued that many funding applications submitted by the NGOs in the district would be discussed at the meeting. He pointed out that the discussion just held had hindered the work progress of all organisations concerned. Understanding that most of

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the NGOs had annual activity programmes of their own, he did not recommend delay in discussion of the funding applications.

55. In response to Mr YEUNG, Mr HUI Chi-fung said that he was unable to submit a discussion paper in time without receiving a formal paper. Mr HUI raised some views regarding the proposal on DC funds allocation, requesting the Chairman to deal with the case by moving a motion for voting by Members. Mr HUI said that, as pointed out in paragraph 9 of the paper, the DC would usually set aside funds for some local organisations when preparing a budget. He enquired what the list of the local organisations was, and whether any amendments, including addition and deletion of some organisations, had been made to the list in the past. Secondly, it was also pointed out in paragraph 9 of the paper that the earmarked funding was in line with the Manual. However, there were disputes in the Committee over the Manual in the past. For example, it was stipulated in the Manual that applicants could not be a political body or aim to give publicity to an individual. Citing an example for illustration, Mr HUI said that the Central District Kai-Fong Welfare Association had fielded candidates for the DC Election. He asked whether the history of the applicants would be checked when the Secretariat assessed the applicants’ background. Thirdly, Mr HUI had been advising on not to organise one-off activities or performances with the DC funds as much as possible in the past years since the funds should be used to solve problems in the community. Mr HUI understood that the DC had previously allocated some funds to conduct two traffic studies, including “To Explore Ways to Solve the Problem of Insufficient Parking Spaces in the Central and Western District” and “Whether the Prohibited Zone at Westbound of Caine Road should be Cancelled”. Although Mr HUI did not object to organise National Day celebration activities, he thought that the local organisations and C&WDO would repeatedly hold similar activities at the same places within a short time every year. In this connection, he thought that the entire allocation of almost $500,000 reserved for organising National Day celebration activities should be deleted. Fourthly, regarding the district minor works (DMW) projects, Mr HUI found that it was a very long process indeed to go through the stages of proposing projects by Members, granting approval by the DC and completing the projects. He understood that staff of the C&WDO had always endeavoured to follow up the projects, and that the slow progress of projects was mainly due to shortage of manpower. Mr HUI suggested that some one-off activities should be deleted from the funding proposal, and should increase the allocation reserved for the recruitment of dedicated staff so as to employ additional staff to specifically deal with the DMW projects. Fifthly, Mr HUI had been advocating the allocation of funds to upgrade the equipment in the DC’s conference room over the years, as well as the provision of live webcast of the proceedings of the DC meetings in order to enhance the transparency of the DC. Mr HUI said he received from time to time public opinion that asked for live webcast of the DC meetings, and such view was generally supported by people. He suggested that the allocation reserved for various committees and working groups should be

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reduced with a view to reserving several hundred thousand dollars to $1 million for upgrading the equipment of the conference room.

56. The Chairman enquired whether Mr HUI had any specific views and if yes, suggested that he should put them forth then.

57. Mr HUI said that he needed time for drafting and other Members might give their comments first.

58. The Chairman invited Mrs WONG to give her initial response to Mr HUI’s views.

59. Mrs WONG said that the list of designated organisations mentioned by Mr HUI had already been set out in paragraph 10 of the paper. Mrs WONG wanted to clarify that the Central District Kai-Fong Welfare Association, which was cited by Mr HUI, was not a designated organisation in C&W District. It was a routine for the DC to reserve allocation to designated organisations in the district, and the arrangement for reviewing the designated organisations had been introduced to Members at the FC meeting last year during the discussion on proposal on DC funds allocation. The HAD had also briefed the members of the Legislative Council (LegCo) on the arrangement. To enhance the transparency, the Secretariat would simultaneously submit the proposal on DC funds allocation and the list of designated organisations to the FC for Members’ consideration. Most of the designated organisations set out in paragraph 10 of the paper were committees under the C&WDO and local organisations specifically providing services for the C&W District. Most of these organisations were developed according to the policy of implementing district administration since the 1980s and were specifically providing services to the district. The DC would reserve some resources for these organisations every year to provide continuous services in the district. The Central District Kai-Fong Welfare Association as mentioned by Mr HUI was not one of the above designated organisations. It belonged to the category of other local organisations in C&W District as stated in paragraph 11 of the paper, which also included social welfare agencies in the district, and the DC would not reserve allocation for this kind of organisations. Despite earmarking funding for designated organisations, the DC would still consider the funding applications case by case. Regarding National Day celebration activities, Mrs WONG understood that Mr HUI was not opposed to the holding of National Day celebration activities, and she had been putting efforts to inject diversified elements to National Day celebration activities and avoid organising the same activities repeatedly. In recent years, the C&WDO and C&WDC had focused more on the implementation of community service in the district and organised less one-off activities to the greatest extent. For example, they encouraged the social welfare agencies in the district to organise more innovative services, including arts education, promotion of history and culture, health education and promotion of environmental

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protection, etc. These elements had also been included in the National Day celebration activities organised by the C&WDO as much as possible, with a view to attracting the families and even young people in the district to participate more in the C&WDO activities. Regarding activity venue, Mrs WONG said that there were several new venues in the district available for holding activities by organisations at present, such as the waterfront promenade. She welcomed Members to express their views on activity venues at any time for consideration. Mrs WONG said that the C&WDO had always strived to introduce new elements to the activities and expected that Members would have active participation in them. She continued that the activities organised in C&W District at present would provide service to a lot of residents. The figures for 2017 showed that the total number of participants in activities funded by the C&WDC had exceeded 1.68 million, making the district ranked second among the 18 districts in this respect, and providing evidence that the DC-funded activities were well received by the residents.

60. Mr NG Siu-hong said that allocation for civic education activities was reduced by about 70% this year as compared with last year. Some Members had just pointed out that only about $30,000 of the allocation was granted last year, but they had overlooked that an actual amount of $90,000 was granted in the year before last. Mr NG therefore opined that the allocation for civic education activities this year should not be substantially reduced simply by making reference to the figures of last year. It was precisely owing to the small amount of allocation granted last year that it was necessary for the DC to encourage various organisations in the district to organise civic education activities. If reduction in allocation for civic education activities was required, he recommended a reduction of 11% to align with the reduction level of other activity items.

61. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai thanked Mr NG Siu-hong for attaching importance to civic education activities. He supported organising more such activities in the district very much. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai hoped that the NGOs attending the meeting could assist in organising the activities. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai also said that if there was enthusiastic response in application, he had confidence in securing more funding from the FC.

62. Mr CHAN Hok-fung said that some Members wanted to increase the allocation for civic education activities. He proposed to reduce the allocation for the Working Group on Escalators and transfer the resources to hold civic education activities because he understood that the primary work of the Working Group on Escalators in the previous year was to introduce the escalators to residents through distribution of souvenirs. In fact, it should not need to promote the escalators anymore. Regarding Mr HUI Chi-fung’s proposal of purchasing equipment in the conference room with DC funds for live webcast of DC meetings, Mr CHAN Hok-fung said using DC funds in this way might give an impression to the public that the DC was acting for its own benefit, but still he agreed with Mr HUI’s proposal because Members’ behaviour during

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meetings would be exposed to the full when there was live broadcast of the proceeding of DC meetings. Mr CHAN Hok-fung stated that he supported setting up live webcast of the DC meetings to safeguard the interests of Members and the public.

63. Mr YIP Wing-shing said that the time of submitting the paper was later than usual, but he understood that the efforts in calculating accurate figures was the reason of the delay. Mr YIP agreed that matters relating to the DC funds should be handled in a fair, just and open manner. He requested passing the minutes of the FC meeting to the Ad-hoc Working Group for its discussion on the way of handling this kind of paper lest time should be further wasted on discussing the Standing Orders at committee meetings in future.

64. In response to Mr CHAN Hok-fung’s suggestion, Mr NG Siu-hong said that the Working Group on Escalators had endorsed to distribute the escalator refurbishment works timetable. As the refurbishment works for the Mid-levels escalators had commenced in recent years and residents wanted to know the works period of each section of the escalators, there was a genuine need for reserving allocation for the Working Group on Escalators. As for Mr CHAN Chit-kwai stating that organisations would be invited to submit applications first, and then additional funds would be sought from the FC if the allocation was found to be inadequate to cover the expenditure, Mr NG opined that it was a rather roundabout approach and proposed to directly increase the allocation for civic education activities. Mr NG said it might not be necessary to hold the kind of activities currently organised in order to achieve the objective of enhancing the public’s sense of belonging to the Motherland. As such, he thought that the allocation for National Day celebration activities should be reduced and the reduced amount should be transferred to civic education activities, so that funding for civic education activities and other items would equally be reduced by 11%.

65. Mr CHAN Hok-fung enquired whether Mr NG Siu-hong, the Chairman of the Working Group on Escalators, knew that the price for each set of its promotional materials currently distributed, which included a zipper pouch and a folder, was $14. Mr CHAN did not see the relationship between the promotional materials and the escalator refurbishment works timetable as mentioned by Mr NG.

66. Mr NG Siu-hong said that Members belonging to the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) might directly give their comments if they considered it unnecessary to distribute promotional materials and leaflets informing the residents of the escalator refurbishment works schedule.

67. The Chairman hoped that both Members would cease to discuss the publicity materials of the 20

Working Group on Escalators, and that they should concentrate on discussing the proposal on DC funds allocation instead. The Chairman summarised Mr NG Siu-hong’s opinion by stating that Mr NG wanted to increase the allocation for civic education activities, so that the cut in percentage would be on a par with other items, i.e. reduced by 11% as compared with last year. Such being the case, it was necessary to reduce the allocation for another item in the funding proposal and transfer the resources to organise civic education activities. The Chairman explained that apart from the DC funds earmarked for civic education activities, the DC would receive an additional allocation of $200,000 from the Committee on the Promotion of Civic Education (CPCE) for organising such activities by local organisations, and the related applications would be recommended by the CLSAC for approval by the CPCE. The Chairman did not agree with reducing the allocation for the Working Group on Escalators because the amount would still not meet the required level of allocation even if all of its resources were to be transferred to the item of civic education activities. The Chairman recommended a reduction of $59,000* from the item “For application by other local organisations” and transfer of the amount to the item “civic education activities”. Regarding live broadcast, the Chairman understood that the Secretariat had invited quotation about live broadcast of DC meetings, and some Members had commented that the price was too high then. The Chairman had no objection to the Secretariat conducting another round of quotation exercise. In case Members considered the price of quotation reasonable, the FC might discuss on the reallocation of the DC funds as a whole for upgrading of equipment in the conference room.

(*Post-meeting note: It was originally proposed to allocate $30,000 for civic education activities this year in the proposal on DC funds allocation. However, as the allocation for the item was $105,000 in the previous year, the amount of allocation would become $93,450 after a reduction by 11%. Therefore, the amount required for transfer was amended as $63,450.)

68. Mr YIP Wing-shing supported the upgrading of equipment in the conference room and provision of live broadcast of the DC meetings to enhance the transparency of the DC. However, as the DC funds came from the HAD’s provision, he had no idea if the allocation could be used for such purpose. Mr YIP hoped that Mrs WONG would provide relevant information after the meeting for the DC’s reference, including whether similar requests had been made in the other 17 districts and, if yes, how the requests were handled. Moreover, the C&WDC and the Islands District Council (IsDC) shared the use of the conference room at present. If broadcast equipment was to be installed, discussion on the expenditure with the IsDC might be required. Mr YIP opined that DC funds should be used for organising district activities. He therefore hoped that the Government could provide resources for live broadcast of DC meetings.

69. Mr CHAN Choi-hi agreed with Mr YIP Wing-shing. Mr CHAN pointed out that Radio 21

Television Hong Kong (RTHK) was responsible for conducting live broadcast of the LegCo meetings at present, and suggested that live broadcast of the DC meetings should be arranged in the same way.

70. Mr HUI Chi-fung wanted to clarify that the then quotation for upgrading the equipment of the conference room was informally obtained by staff of the C&WDO. The quotation only stated an estimated price. There was no formal paper or record stating the exact price and equipment to be provided in the quotation, as well as whether the quotation was obtained according to the government’s formal procurement procedures. Mr HUI said that many projects were implemented with DC funds in the past because the Government was unable to provide resources, such as the waterfront promenade and Mount Davis Fresh Water Primary Service Reservoir. This was the usual way of operation of the DC, and he did not agree that it would exploit the benefit of residents by upgrading the equipment of the conference room with the DC funds.

71. Mrs WONG added that owing to the discussion on upgrading of the equipment in the conference room at a full council meeting of the C&WDC, the C&WDO had actually obtained some similar but useful information from the Secretariat of the LegCo in an informal manner. It was because a formal invitation for quotation in accordance with the Government’s procurement procedures could be conducted only after the requirement of the service concerned had been confirmed. Despite the informal nature of the quotation, the Secretariat still set out the available price in Annex I of the C&WDC Paper No. 86/2017 for Members’ reference with a view to giving a reply to Members’ enquiry as far as possible. The paper stated that if the initiative was implemented by way of service procurement, that is, live broadcast of each meeting by contractor, a total amount of about $2.1 million per annum would be required assuming there were 36 meetings a year and each meeting would not last for more than four hours. If the service was to be provided through purchase of equipment, the costs might be as much as a few million dollars. Members might decide whether this amount would be earmarked from the annual provision of about $20 million currently allocated to the C&WDC. Members might also decide whether they would request the C&WDO to obtain a formal quotation for the service. It was note-worthy that the ceiling of funding for each CI project being discussed by Members was $2.5 million. Understanding that Members had discussed on this matter in the past meetings, Mrs WONG had reflected the views to the HAD which had to deliberate over the overall arrangement of the DCs of the 18 districts. As told by Mr YIP, the C&WDC had been sharing the use of the conference room with the IsDC. Mrs WONG said it was necessary to consult the IsDC for installation of the proposed equipment. As far as she knew, the IsDC had not received such request or view so far. Mrs WONG also said that she had considered other solutions, such as using the funds for DMW projects which, however, was infeasible because it was stipulated that such funds could not be used for government properties.

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72. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai agreed to increase the DC’s transparency. However, two main problems remained to be solved at this stage, including negotiation with the IsDC, and whether the funding for CI projects was adequate for the purpose of upgrading the DC’s equipment. Moreover, as the expenditure on the service for live broadcast of DC meetings was a recurrent expenditure, he considered it unfair for the C&W District to reserve about $2 million each year for this purpose. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai agreed with Mr CHAN Choi-hi that live broadcast of the DC meetings should be carried out by the RTHK.

73. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that the Government still did not respond to his proposal of recruiting designated officers for handling the DMW projects. Mr HUI asked the Chairman whether it was time to present his four views for consideration.

74. The Chairman said that he had been expecting Members to immediately raise their views from the beginning of the discussion so that other Members might state their stances without moving a motion. The Chairman opined that it was unnecessary to state Members’ position by voting because a conclusion could be drawn through discussion and consolidation of Members’ views. The Chairman invited Mr HUI to read out the views.

75. Mr HUI asked whether he should read out the views one by one and then let Members state their position towards each item.

76. The Chairman suggested that Mr HUI should read out all his views, and he would invite Members to state their position afterwards.

77. Mr HUI opined that the Chairman did not handle this matter properly because his four views were quite long.

78. The Chairman said Mr HUI could give his draft to the Secretariat which would immediately make arrangement for displaying the views on the screen. The Chairman announced that the meeting would be adjourned for ten minutes for making the aforesaid arrangement.

79. The Chairman announced the resumption of the meeting.

80. The Chairman noted that two of the views raised by Mr HUI Chi-fung at the meeting contained the word “resolves”. Having pointed out that they were not dealing with a motion at that time, he recommended deletion of the word “resolves”.

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81. Mr HUI Chi-fung agreed to the amendment.

82. The Chairman said that the views raised by Mr HUI included the wording “The Committee”. Since these views were put forth by Mr HUI rather than the DC, he suggested that the wording should be amended from “The Committee” to “I”.

83. Mr HUI Chi-fung agreed to delete the two words “The Committee”, but did not agree to replace them with “I”.

84. The Chairman said that the four views currently raised by Mr HUI were all Mr HUI’s personal views.

85. Mr HUI agreed to amend the wording as “I propose to”.

86. After amendment, the four views raised by Mr HUI Chi-fung were as follows:

“I propose to(1) delete the proposed allocation of $450,554 for “National Day celebration

activities” under C&WDC and its Committees and Working Groups.(2) increase the proposed allocation for “Recruitment of designated officers” under

C&WDC and its Committees and Working Groups by not less than $500,000 for purpose in relation to staffing for handling DMW projects.

(3) amend the Manual on the Use of District Council Funds (the Manual), requesting the DC Secretariat to check whether the applicants have participated in public elections for ascertaining that the applicants meet the requirement about they must not be political associations as set out in Section 6.3.2 of the Manual.

(4) reserve allocation for installation of real-time recording and broadcasting facilities in the DC’s conference room, in order to enable live webcast of the DC’s public meetings via the DC’s website.”

87. The Chairman said that Members were welcomed to raise their views, and Members might submit their views in writing to facilitate others to understand. Since Mr HUI had just said that it would take longer time to read out the views on-the-spot, he wanted to present the views in writing on-the-spot for Members’ perusal. The Chairman wanted to clarify that the four views were neither provisional motions nor provisional papers tabled by Member. Instead, they were Mr HUI’s personal views. The Chairman invited Members to state their position on the first view regarding deletion of the funds allocated for National Day celebration activities.

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88. Mr CHAN Hok-fung thought that it was unnecessary to entertain the suggestion, and he supported the allocation for National Day celebration activities.

89. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai considered the allocation for National Day celebration activities necessary. He said some Members opined that many National Day celebration activities were repetitive at present. However, he understood that under the existing arrangement, if local organisations knew which kind of activities would be held by the Government, they would try their best to avoid organising similar events.

90. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming supported the continued allocation of funds for organising National Day celebration activities.

91. The Chairman understood that Mr HUI was opposed to allocate funds for organising National Day celebration activities, so he needed not state his position again.

92. Mr YIP Wing-shing supported allocating funds for organising National Day celebration activities.

93. The Chairman enquired whether any Member objected to allocate funds for organising National Day celebration activities or objected to the proposed amount of allocation. The Chairman stated that he supported the allocation of funds for organising National Day celebration activities. Regarding Mr HUI’s first view, the Chairman concluded that the number of Members who agreed to the proposed allocation exceeded that of the opponents, and that some Members did not express their opinion.

94. Regarding Mr HUI’s second view, in which he proposed to increase relevant allocation by $500,000 for recruiting designated officers to handle the DMW projects, Mrs WONG noted that Mr HUI had raised the view at the informal meeting held earlier, and understood that the original intent of his proposal was to facilitate the C&WDO to expedite the progress of the DMW projects. Mrs WONG pointed out that 63 DMW projects had been completed within three years and 17 DMW projects were in progress. Among the projects in progress, the completion of some projects was delayed mainly due to individual venue and environmental constraints, and the C&WDO was making every effort to follow them up. The staff responsible for following up the projects were mainly civil servants because implementation of the DMW projects would involve co-ordination among many government departments. Mrs WONG said that the staff deployed had to continuously follow up on the projects. It might not be the most ideal solution by deploying non-civil service contract staff to follow the projects up because of the high wastage

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rates for these posts. Besides, the Executive Assistants currently recruited by the Secretariat with the DC funds could, in addition to carry out the DC activities, assist in handling the general liaison work related to DMW projects when necessary.

95. The Chairman invited Members to comment on Mr HUI’s second views, i.e. allocation of $500,000 for recruitment of dedicated staff to assist in the implementation of the DMW projects.

96. Mr NG Siu-hong supported the proposal.

97. Mr CHAN Hok-fung said that Mrs WONG had clearly explained the current situation to Members, and did not consider it necessary to provide additional funding for the item.

98. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming thought that even if an additional allocation of $500,000 was used to recruit designated officers, such officers were only non-civil service contract staff. As it might not ensure cost-effective use of the allocation, it should be better to reserve the funds for other organisations.

99. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai agreed with Mrs WONG’s proposed arrangement for deploying the existing Executive Assistants to assist in the liaison work to alleviate the burden of the designated officers, believing that it would help expedite the implementation of the DMW projects.

100. The Chairman agreed with the views raised by Mr YEUNG Hok-ming and Mr CHAN Chit-kwai, and said that reallocation of funds might be made by the FC if the need to provide additional resources for recruitment of designated officers arose in future.

101. The Chairman said that Mr HUI’s third view was an issue regarding the Manual rather than the scope of discussion about the proposal on DC funds allocation, and recommended discussion of such issue at other meetings.

102. Mr HUI Chi-fung remarked that the Chairman was inconsistent in handling his four views, and opined that the Chairman should invite discussion on the third one.

103. Mr CHAN Hok-fung said the Chairman had just ruled that the view was unrelated to the proposal on DC funds allocation, thus he hoped Mr HUI would no longer waste time on arguing.

104. The Chairman requested the two Members to halt the argument, and reiterated that he would not invite discussion on the view concerned. The Chairman said that he had given Mr HUI

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adequate time to express his views verbally and in writing. The Chairman opined that the third view was related to the Manual and was therefore outside the scope of discussion on the proposal on DC funds allocation. If Mr HUI wanted to have an in-depth discussion on the view, the Chairman suggested that Mr HUI should submit a paper prior to the next meeting.

105. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that paragraph 9 of the paper had mentioned the Manual, and requested to put the view to record.

106. The Chairman said that Mr HUI’s views would be put to record. Regarding the fourth view of Mr HUI, the Chairman believed that Mrs WONG had given her reply a moment ago and he himself had proposed to hold further discussion after the C&WDO had provided the relevant information during discussion.

107. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that the Chairman should invite discussion on this for other Members to give comment.

108. The Chairman did not consider it necessary to invite discussion again because a few Members had stated that they did not object to the view. The proposal had not been implemented simply due to inadequate resources for the time being.

109. Mr CHAN Hok-fung proposed to transfer the allocation proposed for the Working Group on Escalators to the purpose of civic education activities.

110. Mr NG Siu-hong objected to the proposal.

111. The Chairman suggested that allocation should be reserved for the Working Group on Escalators first, and Members might join the working group to give advice on the use of the funding. If the funds was not fully utilised in the end, the remaining funds could be transferred for other purposes.

112. The Chairman concluded the discussion by proposing to reduce $59,000* from the item “For application by other local organisations” and transferred the amount to the item of civic education activities for use. The Secretariat would amend the paper after the meeting for Members’ reference. The Chairman reiterated that the paper only set out the budget of funds allocation, and the FC would consider and endorse each proposed project case by case. Moreover, the HAD had started to provide the “Guidelines on Review of the List of Designated Organisations” according to the recommendations set out in the Director of Audit’s Report since last year. According to the guidelines, the DCs were required to conduct regular review of the list

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of designated organisations.

(*Post-meeting note: As explained in the post-meeting note of paragraph 67, the amount should be $63,450.)

113. The Committee endorsed the list of designated organisations and the amended proposal on DC funds allocation.

Item 5: Funding Applications of the Committees and Working Groups under Central & Western District Council(C&W FC Paper No. 41/2019 to 45/2019)

114. There were 32 funding applications for consideration at the current meeting, involving an allocation of $ 2,272,481.2 , of which $ 1,337,081.2 was funding for the CI projects of the C&WDC and $935,400 was funding for DMW projects. If all the applications for CI projects were endorsed, the total amount of funds allocated by the FC of the C&WDC in 2019/20 would be $11,436,703.2.

115. The Chairman invited Members to refer to Paper No. 41/2019 for a total of 4 funding applications from the C&WDC, its Committees and Working Groups. The Chairman reminded Members to declare interests prior to the discussion of relevant applications if they had interests in the organisations making the applications.

(Paper No. 42/2019)116. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $147,000 to the Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. Western Integrated Social Service Centre for implementing “‘Say YES to Work’ Youth Job Expo cum Career Exploration 2019”.

(Paper No. 43/2019)117. Regarding two applications for CI projects which were funded by the Women’s Commission, Ms CHENG Lai-king said that she was the C&WDC’s representative to the Women’s Commission, and enquired if she was required to declare interest. The Chairman said that Ms CHENG was performing the duty on behalf of the C&WDC and therefore could continue to participate in the discussion.

118. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $22,900 to the Hong Kong Young Women’s Christian Association Kwun Lung Lau Community Work Office for implementing “Happy

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Women Project”. This allocation was provided by the Women’s Commission.

(Paper No. 44/2019)119. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $30,100 to the Hong Kong Central and Western District Woman Association for implementing “Employment Retraining Scheme for Middle-aged Women”. This allocation was provided by the Women’s Commission.

(Paper No. 45/2019)120. The Committee endorsed a DMW allocation of $935,400 to the District Facilities Management Committee for implementing “Energy-saving works of the lighting systems in the recreational venues in Central & Western District under the Leisure and Cultural Services Department”.

Item 6: Funding Applications of the Local Organisations of the Central & Western District(C&W FC Paper No. 46/2019 to 74/2019)

121. The Chairman invited Members to refer to Paper No. 46/2019 for a total of 28 funding applications from the local organisations. The Chairman reminded Members to declare interests prior to the discussion of relevant applications if they had interests in the organisations making the applications.

(Paper No. 47/2019 to 50/2019)122. Regarding the funding application of the Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts, Mr CHAN Choi-hi declared that he was a member of the association. The Chairman said that Mr CHAN could remain in the meeting but could not participate in discussion.

123. The Committee endorsed four funding applications submitted by the Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts:

- An allocation of $33,500 for organising “Joint Concert of Instrumental Music”;- An allocation of $39,980 for organising “The 36th Central and Western District

Pop Song Singing Contest”;- An allocation of $50,000 for organising “Grand Chinese and Western Art

Exhibition 2019 in Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China cum the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”;

- An allocation of $103,000 for organising “Central and Western District Cantonese 29

Operatic Gala in Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China”.

(Paper No. 51/2019 to 52/2019)124. The Committee endorsed two funding applications submitted by the St. James Settlement Central & Western District Elderly Community Centre:

- An allocation of $32,985 for implementing “Brothers on My Mind・ Project Leap”;

- An allocation of $38,300 for implementing “Shadow Play for the Elderly – Spread Positive Energy Project”.

(Paper No. 53/2019 to 54/2019)125. Regarding the funding application of Caritas Jockey Club Integrated Service for Young People - Shek Tong Tsui, Mr YEUNG Hok-ming declared that he was a member of the Advisory Committee of the organisation. The Chairman said the declaration was at Tier 1 pursuant to the three-tier arrangement, i.e. the Member associated with the organisation in a nominal capacity; hence Mr YEUNG could still take part in the discussion and voting.

126. The Committee endorsed two funding applications submitted by the Caritas Jockey Club Integrated Service for Young People - Shek Tong Tsui:

- An allocation of $13,085 for implementing “Parent-child Interactive Zone”; - An allocation of $4,875 for implementing “Outdoor Activities for Children”.

(Paper No. 55/2019 to 56/2019)127. Regarding the funding application of “Love Your Family Campaign 2019”, Mr CHAN Choi-hi enquired about the details of the Parent-child Archery Game.

128. Ms HUNG Ngai , Unit-in-charge (Service) of Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. Western Integrated Social Service Centre, said that as the game was popular among families, two sessions namely Parent-child Archery Game and Parent-child Archery Game Anew were organised during the summer vacation and at the end of the year respectively. The activity aimed to enhance communication among family members and promote interaction among the participating families.

129. The Committee endorsed two funding applications submitted by the Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. Western Integrated Social Service Centre:

- An allocation of $30,000 for implementing “Love Your Family Campaign 2019”; - An allocation of $30,000 for implementing “Child Development Programme

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2019”.

(Paper No. 57/2019)130. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $55,030 to the Hong Kong Young Women’s Christian Association Kwun Lung Lau Community Work Office for implementing “Loving Family and Good Neighbour Project”.

(Paper No. 58/2019 to 60/2019)131. Regarding the funding application of “Running Women”, Mr CHAN Choi-hi enquired whether concessionary admission fees would be offered to NGOs for visiting Tsz Shan Monastery.

132. Mr LIU Chi-hong , Family Social Worker of Grace & Joy Integrated Family Service Centre of the Hong Kong Catholic Marriage Advisory Council, responded that the participant’s admission fee of $100 included one’s meal costs for the day.

133. Mr CHAN Choi-hi proposed to separate admission fee and meal expense into two items for reimbursement.

134. Mr LIU undertook to amend the budget as recommended.

135. The Chairman said that the Secretariat would liaise with the organisation concerned for making corresponding amendments after the meeting.

136. The Committee endorsed three funding applications submitted by the Grace & Joy Integrated Family Service Centre of the Hong Kong Catholic Marriage Advisory Council:

- An allocation of $17,192 for organising “Running Women”; - An allocation of $24,280 for organising “‘Love and Marriage Series’ 2019”; - An allocation of $31,360 for implementing “‘Love Your Children‧Love More

Your Spouse’ Project”.

(Paper No. 61/2019 to 63/2019)137. Regarding the funding applications of Tung Sin Tan, Mr YIP Wing-shing declared that he was an Honorary Executive Committee Member of the organisation. Mr YIP said he would not take part in the discussion and voting. The Chairman said that Mr YIP should not take part in the discussion and voting for the three applications concerned, but he needed not withdraw from the meeting during the discussion of the applications concerned.

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138. Regarding the activity “Community Caring Programme 2019”, Ms NG Hoi-yan said that the activity would be held in October, and asked whether the elderly needed to visit the office of the Social Welfare Department (SWD) or Tung Sin Tan in person for enrolment.

139. Ms Ruby TANG , Project Coordinator of Tung Sin Tan, said that the elderly might make registration by telephone and then visit the organisation in person for ticket collection. Moreover, Tung Sin Tan would contact the SWD in mid-October about their applicant list, and after verifying that there was no duplication of applicants, the organisation would distribute gift packs to the registered elderly persons.

140. Ms CHENG Lai-king enquired whether the activity would be held in October.

141. Ms TANG said that the organisation would liaise with the SWD in October, and the activity would actually be held in December.

142. Ms CHENG indicated that if the activity was to be held in October, the timing was rather sensitive because the DC Election would be held this year. As she had just seen that some Members had made the declaration of interest, she was concerned about whether the activity would give the beneficiaries a special impression of individual persons, and whether the beneficiaries would give their votes in return by electing such persons in the coming election. Ms CHENG hoped that the situation of offering “snake feasts, vegetarian feasts, moon cakes and rice dumplings” to the public would not appear in the election of the C&WDC.

143. The Committee endorsed the following three funding applications submitted by the Tung Sin Tan:

- An allocation of $5,000 for organising “‘Community Caring Programme 2019’ in Celebration of the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”;

- An allocation of $100,000 for organising “Hong Kong Youth Painting and Calligraphy Competition 2019 in Celebration of the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”;

- An allocation of $75,000 for organising “‘Cantonese Opera Show for the Elderly by Tung Sin Tan 2019’ in Celebration of the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”.

(Paper No. 64/2019)144. Regarding the funding application of “‘A Plastic Ocean’ Film Shows and Workshops in Central and Western District”, Mr YIP Wing-shing pointed out that the registered address of the

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applicant Plastic Oceans Limited was outside the C&W District, and asked whether the applicant had submitted any funding applications to other DCs for the concerned activity.

145. The Chairman asked whether the organisation had submitted funding application to the Wan Chai District Council (WCDC) in February and what the result was.

146. Mr LO Kai-hang , Education Officer of Plastic Oceans Limited, said that funding application for the activity had been submitted to the WCDC this February, and the WCDC rejected the application on grounds of inadequate publicity.

147. The Chairman asked whether the major beneficiaries of the activity were residents in C&W District.

148. Mr LO said that the activity would be held in C&W District with online registration provided, and priority would be assigned to residents in C&W District for participation.

149. Mr CHAN Choi-hi enquired how it could ensure that residents in C&W District would be benefited from the activity.

150. Ms CHENG Lai-king enquired about the venue of the activity.

151. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming noted that recycling of plastic bottles would be included in the activity. However, since some organisations in the district had organised similar activities at present, he was concerned that the applicant’s activity might be overlapping with other activities. Mr YEUNG said that as the social media platform Facebook had a wide range of users, he worried that the organisation concerned could not assign priority to participants who were residents in C&W District. He therefore had reservations on the application. Lastly, he suggested that the organisation should apply for the Environment and Conservation Fund (ECF) of the Environmental Protection Department. As far as he understood, the ECF was abundant in resources.

152. Mr CHAN Hok-fung pointed out that the applicant, being an organisation which had been exempt from tax under Section 88 of the Inland Revenue Ordinance, needed not pay rental for hire of the Western District Community Centre (WDCC). However, it was stated in the application that rental expenditure of an amount $6,600 was reserved for hiring venue. Mr CHAN continued that upon deduction of the rental expenditure, corresponding adjustment to staff expenses was also required.

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153. In response to Members’ enquiries, Mr LO said that apart from Facebook, the organisation would also conduct publicity in the housing estates in the C&W District. When the public completed the online registration form, they would be asked to fill out which districts they were residing. Based on the information provided, the organisation could shortlist the residents in C&W District and assign priority to them for participating in the activity. Regarding the rental for hire of venue, the organisation had tentatively scheduled to hold the activity at the WDCC. Being an organisation which had been exempt from tax in accordance with Section 88 of the Inland Revenue Ordinance, the applicant understood that it did not need to pay the rental for venue. However, if it failed to hire the venue, it would be necessary to hire another venue and the stated amount would be used for such purpose then. Mr LO said that recycling of plastic bottle was just one part of the activity, and the other major activity item was film show. The organisation currently possessed the copyright of a film on environmental protection. For this reason, it hoped that a show of this film might be arranged for residents in C&W District through the activity.

154. The Chairman was of the view that the applicant should clarify the venue for holding the activity first to facilitate consideration by Members. In case it would hire the WDCC, the rental expenditure had to be deducted from the budget. Otherwise, it was necessary to clearly state on the application form the venue to be used for holding the activity. The Chairman suggested that the applicant should liaise with the Secretariat after the meeting for amendment to the funding application, and then the amended application could be considered by Members by circulation of paper.

155. Mr YEUNG Hok-ming wanted to know what the film was about. He also remarked that the activity was not cost-effective since there would only be an audience of 50 persons for watching the film.

156. The Chairman said that as the paper had contained the description of the film, he would not ask Mr LO to make further introduction. He proposed that Mr YEUNG should express his opinion during circulation of the paper.

157. The Committee did not endorse an allocation of $19,910 to Plastic Oceans Limited for organising “‘A Plastic Ocean’ Film Shows and Workshops in Central and Western District”.

(Paper No. 65/2019 to 68/2019)158. Regarding the funding applications of Caritas Community Centre - Caine Road, Mr NG Siu-hong declared that he was the Chairman of the organisation’s Advisory Committee, and Ms NG Hoi-yan declared that she was a member of the organisation’s Advisory Committee. The

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Chairman said that the two Members associated with the organisation in a nominal capacity, hence they could remain in the meeting, take part in the discussion and voting.

159. The Committee endorsed the following four funding applications submitted by the Caritas Community Centre - Caine Road:

- An allocation of $14,050 for organising “Parent-child Volunteer Group - Community Integration Services 2019”;

- An allocation of $25,150 for organising “Forum for the Elderly”; - An allocation of $77,220 for implementing “Community Mental Health Service

Programme 2019: ‘Walking Hand in Hand’”; - An allocation of $14,675 for implementing “Journey with You – After-school

Homework Tutorial Classes”.

(Paper No. 69/2019) 160. Regarding the funding application of “Connecting with the Elderly in Central and Western District”, the Chairman suggested that decimal places should be avoided for the amount of funding sought as far as possible in future.

161. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $72,809.2 to the St. Barnabas’ Society and Home for organising “Connecting with the Elderly in Central and Western District”.

(Paper No. 70/2019)162. Regarding the funding application of “Mount Davis Orienteering Activity 2019”, Ms CHENG Lai-king enquired whether the number of participants of the activity was 500, and whether each participant would be given a uniform since 550 activity uniforms would be provided.

163. Mr KWOK Kam-wing , Organising Committee Member of Friends of Mount Davis Association Limited, replied that each participant and staff member would be provided with an activity uniform.

164. Ms CHENG Lai-king noted that an allocation of $1,000 was applied for providing beverages for participants. She hoped that the organiser would minimise the use of bottled drink to avoid the casual disposal of used plastic bottles up in the hill and would encourage participants to bring their own bottles of water.

165. Mr CHAN Choi-hi proposed to award participants with commemorative certificates rather than medals and trophies.

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166. Mr KWOK Kam-wing said that the organiser would provide bottled drink to the staff assisting in setting up orienteering sites and ensure all the refuse left in the sites was cleared after the activity. Regarding the production of medal, the organisation would order a certain quantity of medals because the more the quantity ordered the cheaper the unit price of medal would be. Regarding Member’s suggestion of distributing less medals, the organisation would think about it.

167. The Chairman opined that it was worthy to endorse an allocation to the activity which was an annual event with many participants. The Chairman continued that the activity’s budget might be adjusted as appropriate, hoping the organiser would take Members’ views into account.

168. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $60,000 to the Friends of Mount Davis Association Limited for organising “Mount Davis Orienteering Activity 2019”.

(Paper No. 71/2019)169. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $24,800 to the The Hong Kong Road Safety Association for organising “Central & Western District Elderly Uniform Groups - Voluntary Service and Activity Overview 2019”.

(Paper No. 72/2019)170. Regarding the funding application of “Caring Community@Art Workshop in Central and Western District”, Mr HUI Chi-fung noted some information uploaded to the applicant’ official website, and presented them for Members’ consideration. As stated in the website of the organisation, culture was a cornerstone of a country’s prosperity and stability. Since its establishment, the association had always held a clear-cut stand in firmly upholding and implementing the principle of “one country, two systems”, supporting the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government in governing in accordance with the law, striking back against the forces splitting the country and activities making Hong Kong become independent. Last year, the association caused an essay to be published in the newspapers which clearly pointed out that the acts fighting for Hong Kong independence were illegal and unconstitutional, violating the Hong Kong Basic Law and domestic law of the HKSAR. The essay also suggested that the HKSAR Government should introduce legislation to prohibit acts related to the cause of Hong Kong independence. As also pointed out in the same website, the organisation aimed to promote the reunification of the Motherland, and was strongly supported by the Liaison Office of the Central People’s Government in the HKSAR. Aiming to unify people who loved the country and Hong Kong, the organisation had an objective of becoming a new strength of loving the country and Hong Kong, strengthening the cohesive force of the Hong

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Kong people towards the Motherland. For example, the activities organised by the organisation included drills of the People’s Liberation Army Hong Kong Garrison, etc. Mr HUI enquired the Secretariat whether the applicant was a political association, and whether it was aware of the above information.

171. Ms CHENG Lai-king said that she did not know the organisation. She wanted to know the registered address of the organisation and whether it was an organisation that had been exempt from tax according to Section 88 of the Inland Revenue Ordinance.

172. The Chairman responded to Ms CHENG by indicating that the registered address of the applicant was at Cosco Tower, No. 183 Queen’s Road Central, and the organisation was registered under Section 5A(1) of the Societies Ordinance (Cap. 151). The Chairman said that the Secretariat did not have the information mentioned by Mr HUI. The Chairman stressed that endorsement of the funding application under discussion at present was to be decided by Members.

173. Mr HUI said that the Secretariat would assess whether all funding applications were in compliance with Section 6.3.2 of the Manual before submitting them to the FC for consideration, and only non-political associations were eligible for applying for DC funds. Mr HUI requested that a government representative gave a reply.

174. The Chairman said the paper clearly stated that the organisation was a registered society rather than a political party. The Chairman believed that he could answer Mr HUI’s enquiry for the Secretariat.

175. Mr HUI did not agree that the Chairman could give a reply on the Government’s behalf, and continued to ask whether an organisation opposing the independence of Hong Kong was a political association.

176. The Chairman held that the representative of the organisation concerned instead of the government representative was supposed to give response at the meeting.

177. Mr CHAN Chit-kwai believed that the Secretariat was accountable to Members and the Committee, and could answer the questions raised by Members.

178. Ms NG Hoi-yan believed that cost-effective use of the allocation might not be achieved since the amount of funds applied was about $17,000 while there would only be 60 beneficiaries from the activity. Secondly, as stated in the application form, one of the publicity measures was

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to liaise with participants of the previous activities related to calligraphy by telephone. Ms NG thought that this method would easily bring full enrolment to the interest class. As such, she wanted to know that for the 60 places of the class, the percentages of participants joining the activity through invitation by telephone and through public invitation. Lastly, Ms NG wanted to know whether the teaching resources were for use by the tutors.

179. Ms SOONG Yuen-shan, Project Director of The Association of Chinese Culture of Hong Kong, responded that the costs of materials used in a calligraphy class and tutor fees were expensive at present. However, the organisation expected that the cost of activity could be reduced by charging fees on participants and reallocating internal resources to cover the costs. Ms SOONG said that small class teaching would be implemented for the activity and there would be about 10 participants for each small class. The advantages of small class teaching included more effective learning of the subject by student, and more time spent on each student by tutor. The materials required for holding the class included painting tools, rice paper and writing brushes, etc.

180. Ms NG asked again about the ratio of places reserved for some persons who were known to be interested in the workshop and were invited to participate over the phone to places reserved for persons who registered for participation through open invitation.

181. Ms SOONG hoped that about 50% of the places would be reserved to persons who were known to be interested in the workshop, whereas the remaining 50% of the places to persons participating through open registration.

182. Ms CHENG Lai-king hoped to ensure cost-effective use of the DC funds, and genuinely benefit residents in C&W District. She indicated that the costs of some calligraphy classes in the market were lower than the amount of the funding application.

183. Ms SOONG said that data collection had been conducted before deciding to organise the activity. It would also make use of organisational resources by displaying some banners to step up publicity efforts for the activity, and would invite residents in C&W District for participation.

184. The Chairman responded to Mr HUI’s enquiry by saying that a proper definition of political association had not been arrived at, and the Secretariat had examined the organisation’s eligibility for application during processing.

185. Mr HUI requested the Chairman to let the government representative to give a reply 38

because it was the responsibility of government representative to give an account of issues regarding the Standing Orders to Members.

186. The Chairman said that it was not the Government’s responsibility of determining whether the applicant was a political association. The Secretariat should have considered whether the application concerned had met the requirement during processing.

187. Mr HUI Chi-fung said that he needed to raise the issue regarding declaration of interest.

188. The Chairman said that declaration of interest, if any, should be made prior to discussion of the paper. The Chairman proposed to endorse the funding application if Members had no other comments.

189. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $16,960 to The Association of Chinese Culture of Hong Kong for organising “Caring Community@Art Workshop in Central and Western District”.

190. Mr HUI Chi-fung left his seat, stood beside the Chairman, and repeatedly requested the Chairman to deal with the problem of declaration of interest.

191. Ms CHENG Lai-king and Ms NG Hoi-yan objected to the funding application.

192. The Chairman said that the two Members’ objections would be put to record.

193. Mr HUI said that the Members belonging to the DAB had received money from The Association of Chinese Culture of Hong Kong without making declaration of interest. Mr HUI said that, during an auction held in a DAB’s dinner reception, the chairman of the organisation successfully bid a painting at $11 million, and the amount was given to the Members of the DAB as donation. Mr HUI said that the DAB’s Members did not made any declaration in this regard.

194. Mr CHAN Hok-fung said that if what Mr HUI had said was established, all Members needed to declare that they received remuneration from the Government whenever they took part in discussion on government papers.

195. Mr HUI continued to request the Chairman to deal with the point of order, and request the Members concerned to make declaration of interest.

196. The Chairman asked Mr HUI not to take away his paper anymore or he would report 39

the case to the Police.

197. As many Members had expressed views on Mr HUI’s behaviour, Mr YIP Wing-shing requested to adjourn meeting.

198. The Chairman opined that the meeting could be continued since there were not too many funding applications pending discussion.

199. Mr HUI Chi-fung repeatedly requested the Chairman to deal with the point of order he raised during discussion.

(Paper No. 73/2019)200. Regarding the funding application of “Circle Care 2019: Hong Kong Mental Health”, Ms NG Hoi-yan noted that, as stated in the application form, the activity would be held in C&W District and the venue charges under application was $6,000. She asked about the exact location of holding the activity.

201. Ms CHENG Lai-king pointed out that the applicant had applied for funds under the items light meals for volunteers, beverages at opening ceremony and refreshment for volunteers at the closing ceremony at $4,500, $1,000 and $3,000 respectively. In her opinion, the percentage for the expenditure on catering accounted for a large proportion of the total amount of funds allocated for the whole activity. She also asked whether or not souvenir and refreshment could not be offered to the same participant at the same time.

202. Ms NG Hoi-yan said the application form stated that there would be 20 volunteers working for the activity. However, 100 sets of light meals for volunteers and 100 sets of refreshment for volunteers were applied. Besides, although there would be 200 participants in the activity, 300 sets of souvenirs were applied. She wanted to ask how the said quantities were calculated.

203. Ms Beatrix TSANG , Community Development Director of Junior Chamber International Bauhinia, said that H6 Conet was the tentative venue for holding the activity. Ms TSANG said that a total of two workshops would be held under the activity, believing that there would be tens of participants joining each workshop. Besides, based on their experience in holding the opening ceremony of the activity, there would be more than 100 people attending the closing ceremony. As the workshops and the closing ceremony were two different activities, participants of the workshops would be given souvenirs and no refreshment would be provided in the workshops.

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204. The Secretary added that when the Secretariat considered the application, it had noted that the expenditure on refreshment and expenditure on souvenirs were for two different events, and the same participant would not receive souvenirs and enjoy refreshment at the same time in one event.

205. Ms CHENG Lai-king said that there would be 100 participants and 100 volunteers attending the closing ceremony, and asked whether the two categories of people would be overlapping.

206. Ms TSANG said that volunteers were members of Junior Chamber International Bauhinia and would assist in holding the activity that day. The participants included representatives of the supporting organisations to the activity and members of the public.

207. Mr HUI Chi-fung requested the Chairman to adjourn the meeting because he suspected that some Members might involve in serious conflict of interest regarding Paper No. 72/2019. He requested the Chairman to deal with the point of order, and requested the District Officer (Central and Western) to respond to Member’s enquiries.

208. Ms CHENG asked whether it was the first time for the applicant to submit funding application, and opined that the amount sought by the applicant was too high.

209. The Chairman said that it was not the first time for the applicant to submit application.

210. Ms NG Hoi-yan enquired whether the number of volunteers and the number of refreshment sets for volunteers stated on the application form had to be consistent. She queried because the application form stated that there were 20 volunteers but 100 sets of refreshment for volunteers were applied.

211. Ms TSANG said that she had not clearly filled out the number of volunteers on the application form. She said that there would be about 20 volunteers to provide service at each activity, and more volunteers were needed for the closing ceremony which was a large-scale event.

212. Ms CHENG said she had an impression that the entire activity was focused on meals, and the expenditure on food was about $10,000.

213. Mr HUI continued to raise the point of order, and requested the Chairman to deal with 41

it.

214. The Chairman considered Ms CHENG’s opinion worthy of reference. He suggested that the organisation should contact the Secretariat and make amendments to the contents of the funding application after the meeting, and then Members’ views could be consulted by circulation of paper.

215. Ms CHENG enquired if travelling allowance for volunteers and refreshment for volunteers could co-exist.

216. The Chairman said that it was possible for the two items to co-exist.

217. The Committee did not endorse an allocation of $57,030 to Junior Chamber International Bauhinia for organising “Circle Care 2019: Hong Kong Mental Health”.

(Paper No. 74/2019)218. Regarding the funding application of “The 8th “Reunification Cup” in Central & Western District - Fitness Dance Competition cum Dancing Fun Night 2019 in Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China cum the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”, Ms CHENG Lai-king enquired whether the amount of fund under application was included in the budget of this year’s DC funds allocation.

219. The Chairman said that the application would be classified under the item “For application by other local organisations”. Funding under this item was open for application for all NGOs.

220. Ms CHENG reminded that this was a DC election year, and expected that all activities would continue to be held with fairness, impartiality and openness.

221. The Committee endorsed an allocation of $70,890 to the Hong Kong Central and Western District Woman Association for organising “The 8th “Reunification Cup” in Central & Western District – Fitness Dance Competition cum Dancing Fun Night 2019 in Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China cum the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region”.

Item 7: Inspection of DC-funded Activities42

222. A total of 26 activities to be conducted by local organisations were considered at this meeting. It was suggested that one-third of them, i.e. 9 activities, should be drawn out for inspection purpose.

223. Mr HUI Chi-fung took away the box for drawing of lots (box) without the Chairman’s consent when the Chairman was drawing lots.

224. The Chairman asked Mr HUI Chi-fung to return the box for drawing out activities for inspection.

225. The Chairman asked for assistance from the C&WDO staff for taking back the box. The Chairman warned Mr HUI Chi-fung that the box was a government property, and if Mr HUI illegally took away government property again, the situation would be identical to that of another case he involved.

226. The Chairman gave repeated warnings to Mr HUI, saying that he would consult Members and decide whether it was necessary to report the case to the Police if Mr HUI did not return the box.

227. The Chairman further requested Mr HUI Chi-fung to return the box, and advised Mr HUI not to intimidate officers of the government.

228. The Chairman said that as Mr HUI was unwilling to return the box, he would immediately report the case to the Police.

229. Mr HUI Chi-fung declared that he took away the box for the time being and would return it to the Government in due course. His purpose of taking away the box was to request the Chairman to deal with the point of order related to Paper No. 72/2019.

230. The Chairman announced to adjourn the meeting for five minutes.

231. The Chairman announced the resumption of the meeting.

232. Mr HUI Chi-fung continued to raise the point of order.

233. The Chairman started anew the process of drawing out activities for inspection using the box temporarily made by the Secretariat and nine activities were drew out:

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FC Paper No. Name of Activity Applicant Organisation

FC Paper No.49/2019

Grand Chinese and Western Art Exhibition 2019 in Celebration of

the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s

Republic of China cum the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment

of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region

Central & Western District Association for Culture and Arts

FC Paper No.54/2019 Outdoor Activities for Children

Caritas Jockey Club Integrated Service for Young People - Shek

Tong TsuiFC Paper No.

55/2019Love Your Family Campaign

2019Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. Western

Integrated Social Service CentreFC Paper No.

56/2019Child Development Programme

2019Hong Kong Y.W.C.A. Western

Integrated Social Service Centre

FC Paper No.60/2019

“Love Your Children‧Love More Your Spouse” Project

Grace & Joy Integrated Family Service Centre of The Hong Kong

Catholic Marriage Advisory Council

FC Paper No.66/2019

Forum for the ElderlyCaritas Community Centre -

Caine RoadFC Paper No.

68/2019Journey with You – After-school

Homework Tutorial ClassesCaritas Community Centre -

Caine RoadFC Paper No.

73/2019Circle Care 2019: Hong Kong

Mental HealthJunior Chamber International

Bauhinia

FC Paper No.74/2019

The 8th “Reunification Cup” in Central & Western District –

Fitness Dance Competition cum Dancing Fun Night 2019 in

Celebration of the 70th Anniversary of the Founding of the People’s Republic of China

cum the 22nd Anniversary of the Establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region

Hong Kong Central and Western District Woman Association

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Item 8: Any other business

234. There was no other business.

Item 9 : Date of the next meeting

235. The 8th FC meeting in 2018-19 would be held on 20 June 2019. The deadline for submission of funding applications would be 30 May 2019.

236. The meeting was adjourned at 5:49 pm.

The minutes were confirmed on 20 June 2019

Chairman: Mr LEE Chi-hang, Sidney, MH

Secretary: Ms YIP Wing-yan, Sonia

Central and Western District Council SecretariatJune 2019

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