Invest in Hong Kong's future through infrastructural development
21 January 2018
Last week, I visited the Happy Valley Underground Stormwater Storage Scheme project to inspect the flood prevention work for Happy Valley and Wan Chai. The storage tank, with a capacity of 60 000 cubic metres, or about 24 standard swimming pools, serves as temporary storage for runoff during heavy rains, which will be discharged later at opportune times in order to relieve the load of downstream drainage system and reduce the risk of flooding.
 |
The storage tank came into full operation in March 2017, following the commissioning of Phase 1 in March 2015. The flood prevention facility was proven remarkably effective first during the black rainstorm in October 2016, and again when Hong Kong was hit by Hato, the number 10 Typhoon, in August 2017.
The whole project was completed a year ahead of schedule. Early commissioning of the flood prevention infrastructure has resulted in timely protection for residents against heavy storms and flooding. A sooner completion date, coupled with other cost-saving measures, reduced the construction cost by nearly $90 million, or 8% of the ultimate target cost. The approved project estimate for the entire scheme was $1.07 billion.
The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government attaches great importance to the development of infrastructure. Considerable efforts have been made to strengthen our infrastructure, improve people's livelihood, invest in Hong Kong's future and increase the city's competitiveness in the long term. Our world-class infrastructure, ranked as the world's best by the World Economic Forum in the Global Competitiveness Report, is something that we should be proud of.
 |
The Chief Executive mentioned in her Question and Answer Session in the Legislative Council (LegCo) two weeks ago that, in the remainder of the current legislative session, the Government would submit more than 80 funding applications to the LegCo Public Works Subcommittee (PWSC), with total expenditure amounting to more than $130 billion, and 44 000 jobs expected to be created by the public works projects involved.
They will outnumber those planned for the previous legislative year, i.e. some 40 funding applications to the PWSC with total estimated expenditure around $100 billion.
Most of the public works projects proposed by the Government are closely related to people's livelihood, including five hospital construction or redevelopment projects (involving about $32 billion), six infrastructural and ancillary facility projects relating to housing supply (involving about $8 billion), 13 sports, cultural and community recreational facility projects (involving about $6 billion), as well as seven school redevelopment and improvement projects (involving about $2.3 billion).
Other major projects include the Cross Bay Link in Tseung Kwan O, widening of Tai Po Road (Sha Tin Section), Shek Wu Hui Effluent Polishing Plant, Inland Revenue Tower in Kai Tak Development and construction of Joint-user Government Office Building in Cheung Sha Wan, involving estimated expenditure of about $23 billion.
In the 2017-18 legislative session, the PWSC has endorsed nine works projects at seven meetings (excluding the first meeting for election of chairman and vice-chairman). All but one were outstanding items not yet considered by the PWSC in the last legislative session, with a total commitment of $8.2 billion.
 |
Meanwhile, the Finance Committee (FC) has dealt with 12 works projects and approved about $73 billion in funding in this legislative session. They were, however, either outstanding FC items carried over from the last legislative session, or previous outstanding items cleared by the PWSC recently.
At present, one PWSC agenda item awaiting approval is the funding application for Capital Works Reserve Fund (CWRF) block allocations for 2018-19. It involves more than 10 000 items with a total allocation of nearly $12.5 billion (inclusive of about $10 billion for works-related block allocations). If this funding application is not approved by the FC before the year 2018-19 begins (i.e. before 1 April 2018), about 9 000 ongoing items on various scales under CWRF block allocations will come to a halt and 1 300 proposed new items (about 1 000 of which are related to public works) will be withheld. As the CWRF block allocations cover a wide range of projects, a large number of minor works projects (ranging from landslip preventive works, refurbishment for government buildings, drainage works, waterworks and highway works to works related to university, school and welfare facilities) that are aimed at improving our living environment will be held up. It will also deal a blow to companies undertaking these minor works projects and in turn affect the livelihood of more than 10 000 employees.
Apart from the above, the Government is going to submit at least 30 proposals to the FC and the Establishment Sub-committee (ESC) for approval, with a view to promoting Hong Kong's economic development and meeting people's needs.
One of the proposals is the introduction of the non-means tested Public Transport Fare Subsidy Scheme, which will soon be tabled for FC's consideration. The scheme will give out subsidies of around $2.3 billion a year and is expected to benefit more than 2.2 million Octopus card holders. Another proposal is the development of a new intelligent sports and recreation services booking and information system at a cost around $500 million.
I hope that in the long-term interests of the public and Hong Kong as a whole, the PWSC, ESC and FC will handle the works projects, funding requests and proposed initiatives in a sensible and pragmatic manner. Their timely approval will allow the Government to proceed with implementation promptly and enable the public to enjoy the benefits as early as possible.
A solid and reliable infrastructure is crucial to Hong Kong. Had we not acted for the future by building the underground stormwater storage tank sooner rather than later, rainstorm flooding would still be an ongoing threat to the neighbourhood of Happy Valley and Wan Chai.
The politically accountable team of the HKSAR Government and the civil service will continue to work in unison and, embracing every challenge that comes our way, strive to take forward policies and initiatives beneficial to the people. Time matters and every second counts. I look forward to the smooth and early completion of more such works projects.
