**************************************************

    Following is the English version of the speech by the Secretary for the Civil Service, Mr Joseph W P Wong, in the Legislative Council today (April 27) for the Second Reading debate of the Appropriation Bill 2005:

Madam President,

    I would like to thank Members who spoke on civil service matters at the LegCo debate on Appropriation Bill 2005 last week. I have noted down Members' concrete proposals and believe that we would further discuss them at future meetings of the Panel on Public Service.

    As mentioned by the Financial Secretary in his Budget Speech 2005/06, with the joint efforts of Directors of Bureaux and colleagues in the civil service, the various expenditure control measures taken by the Government are gradually producing results, marked by a reduction in operating expenditure ever recorded in over 50 years. Our civil servants are commended for their flexibility to try new approaches and their endeavours to reduce operating expenditure while maintaining a quality service. I would like to elaborate on this here.

    First of all, for civil service pay and staff-related expenses, there has been a gradual reduction both in terms of the actual expenditure and a percentage of Government operating expenditure. We estimate that civil service pay and staff-related expenses will be about 65.3 billion dollars in this financial year, down from about 71.3 billion dollars in 2001/02, representing a reduction from a share of almost 36 per cent in 2001/02 to about 31 per cent in this financial year in Government operating expenditure.

    As regards civil service establishment, it has been reduced from the peak of 198 000 in early 2000 to the present level of about 166 000, while actual strength has dropped below 160 000. During this period, implementation of "individual visits", promotion of tourism, 24-hour opening of border crossings, combating SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) and infection control measures, maintaining law and order, and closer economic partnership with the Mainland etc. have increased the workload and job complexity of frontline civil servants. I take this opportunity to thank fellow civil servants for demonstrating their usual professionalism, which has earned both the trust and acclaim of the community.

    An honest and clean civil service is a cornerstone of our effective governance. I am pleased to tell you that the civil service overall has maintained a high standard of integrity and our ethical culture is constantly improving. For example, in comparison with 2000, the number of corruption reports against civil servants received by the Independent Commission Against Corruption and the number of convictions saw a drop of 26 per cent and 52 per cent respectively last year. As a separate indicator, the results of an opinion survey conducted by the Government in mid-2004 showed that almost 80 per cent of the respondents considered our civil servants clean and efficient.

    At the special meeting of the Finance Committee on April 11, 2005, I briefed Members on the major tasks of the Civil Service Bureau in the year ahead, namely further streamlining the civil service establishment, conduct of a pay level survey, review of civil service allowances and enhancement of civil service training. These tasks underpin the objective of our civil service reforms, ongoing since 1999, to ensure that Hong Kong continues to have a modernised world-class civil service.

    I expect that in the new financial year, with close cooperation of LegCo Members and in full consultation with the civil servants, we would continue to take forward the civil service reform progressively. I am confident that the Hong Kong civil service is and will continue to be a professional, clean, politically-neutral and efficient civil service capable of delivering quality services cost-effectively to the community.

    Thank you.

Ends/Wednesday, April 27, 2005

NNNN