Motion Debate on Election of the Chief Executive and
all members of the Legislative Council by Universal Suffrage

Madam Deputy, the Liberal Party has several views on the motion today.

First, we notice that many members of the Legislative Council Panel on Constitutional Affairs are urging the Government to launch consultation as soon as possible, or earlier than scheduled. The Government has replied that consultation will not be launched until 2004. Certainly, 2004 is such a long time. Is consultation going to be launched at the beginning of the year, in the middle of it, or after the Legislative Council Election? We are still awaiting a reply from the Government. However, to the Liberal Party (and we have been saying so since 2000), the appropriate time for full consultation should be 2003. Why do we say so? Actually, there are many divergent views from the various functional sectors. Some individual functional sectors support the abolition of all functional constituency seats, but do all the other functional sectors think likewise? Not necessarily, I must say.

This is even the case with the common masses. If we ask them whether they support the full implementation of direct elections, most of them will certainly answer in the affirmative. But if we instead ask them whether they support the abolition of all functional constituency seats, I do not think all of them will necessarily answer in the affirmative. Besides, from the actual operation of the Legislative Council, we can in fact notice that Functional Constituency Members have also been offering lots of useful advice on many issues, ranging from bills to motion debates. And, a Member's representativeness is not necessarily related to whether he or she is directly elected. This is especially true in the case of many legal issues. For example, during the scrutiny of bills, many Members from the professions (such as accounting, engineering and technology) are often able to offer insights which can help us perfect the whole piece of legislation. For this reason, regarding the full implementation of direct elections for the Legislative Council in 2008, that is, the abolition of all functional constituency seats, I think there is a need to launch consultation as soon as possible.

But the Democratic Party has actually implied that there is no need for any consultation, because they think that since the people have clearly stated their demand for the full implementation of direct elections, that is, for the abolition of all functional sectors, there should be no more need for any consultation at all. They think that if the aim of consultation is to gauge opinions, and since very clear views have already been expressed, any further consultation is "bogus". Maybe, we should not say "bogus", but to them, there has already been consultation; or, they simply think that since the outcome is already known, it is not necessary to conduct any consultation at all. They simply wonder why we should not proceed direct to writing up a paper on the full implementation of direct elections.

Their motion makes no mention of how the Chief Executive is to be elected by universal suffrage in 2007. The Liberal Party agrees with them in this respect. Can one interpret "after 2007" as mentioned in the Basic Law as also covering the year 2007 itself? The Government says that legal advice has to be sought, and I hope that it can give us an answer as soon as possible. As we pointed out at the very beginning, a transition period of 10 years, that is from 1997 to 2007, is already long enough, so the Liberal Party is of the view that if a transition period of 10 years is really deemed long enough, then regarding the Chief Executive Election, "after 2007" can in fact be interpreted as also covering the election in 2007. We hold this view because we look at the functional constituency seats in the Legislative Council in the same way. However, the Chief Executive is a human being, and so we cannot possibly demand that half of the Chief Executive be returned by direct elections and the other half by functional constituencies. Even under the principle of gradual and orderly progress, sooner or later, there will be a nominating committee and then universal suffrage. We therefore do not think that "after 2007" must necessarily be interpreted to exclude the term from 2007 to 2012. We think that judging from the wording of the text, the term from 2007 to 2012 should also be included.

The last point is about the appointment system for DCs. I think this may not be the thrust of the motion, because the pro-democracy camp also knows that although 25% of DC members are appointed, these members have not posed any obstacles in respect of any specific livelihood issues. These members have only been providing advice as a kind of assistance. In fact, as far as voting is concerned, since 75% of DC members are returned by "one person, one vote" and only 25% of them are appointed, people simply do not have to fear that appointed members can prevail over directly elected members. I notice that in the past four years, in the Central and Western DC, there was seldom any voting. Most of the time, members just discussed things among themselves and then asked the Government to follow up the matters concerned. And, in most cases, the Government did not really do so. But in any case, there were seldom any conflicts as such between appointed DC members and their elected counterparts. Quite the contrary, the appointed members of a number of DCs have offered some useful advice for the reference of their elected counterparts. In Kwun Tong, for example, there are many industrial activities, so it should be acceptable to appoint members from the industrial sector. And, in the Central and Western DC, an appointed member is an accountant, and he even served as the Chairman of the Finance Subcommittee of the DC in its last term, providing professional management of the funds allocated by the Government.

Therefore, having looked at all these considerations, should we still think that all appointed seats in DCs should be abolished and replaced by directly elected seats? I would not say that the abolition of appointed membership would really bring forth anything so bad. I also do not think that the retention of appointed members will adversely affect the operation of DCs, or prevent residents from voicing their views. Nor do I think that the retention of appointed membership should be used as an excuse of any highly negative comments.

Madam Deputy, for all these reasons, the Liberal Party opposes the motion.