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Following is a question by the Hon Vincent Fang and a reply by the Secretary for Food and Health, Dr York Chow, in the Legislative Council today (April 30):
Question:
In the Budget for this financial year, the Financial Secretary proposed to waive the business registration fee for the current year to benefit all companies. However, some fixed-pitch hawkers and itinerant hawkers have relayed to me that as they must pay licence fee instead of business registration fee, they could not be benefited from this concessionary measure. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) of the types of registration fees currently payable to the Government by businesses engaging in various kinds of economic activities in Hong Kong, and the current number of businesses which have to pay business registration fee;
(b) of the respective current numbers of traders required and those not required to pay business registration fee, the types of fees payable by them to the Government for their trading activities and the amount involved; and
(c) given that fixed-pitch hawkers and itinerant hawkers are currently required to pay licence fee to the Government in order to continue running their business, and such an arrangement is similar in nature to business registration fee payment, whether the Government has any plan to waive the hawker licence fee for the current financial year, thereby achieving the aim of "returning wealth to the people"; if it has, whether the arrangement will be on par with that of the business registration fee waiver, i.e. waiving hawker licence fee for the whole year; if it does not have such a plan, of the reasons for that?
Reply:
Madam President,
(a) According to the information provided by the Financial Services and the Treasury Bureau, businesses engaging in various kinds of economic activities in Hong Kong, except for those exempted from registration, are required to register with the Government and pay business registration fee as well as the levy for the Protection of Wages on Insolvency Fund (the levy). However, under the Business Registration Ordinance, small businesses with average monthly total sales or receipts not exceeding the prescribed limit can apply for exemption from the payment of business registration fee and the levy. Besides, certain types of business are also required to pay various kinds of licence fees as they are subject to Government's regulation. At present, about 820,000 businesses are required to pay business registration fee.
(b) Under the Business Registration Regulations, hawkers requiring licences for the carrying on of business under the Hawker Regulation are not required to register, unless the business is carried on inside a building. As there is no differentiation of business nature under the business registration system, the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) does not maintain statistics on the number of hawkers required to pay business registration fee.
There are, in essence, two categories of hawker licences, namely fixed-pitch hawker licence and itinerant hawker licence. All hawkers are required to pay to the Government fees for the issue and renewal of hawker licences. The annual licence fees for fixed-pitch hawkers in the urban area and the New Territories are $1,980 and $2,100 respectively, while the itinerant hawker licence fee ranges from $980 to $2,640 per year, and the mobile ice-cream van licence fee is about $20,000 per year. Fixed-pitch hawkers are required to pay an additional fee for the allocation and use of fixed pitches. This fee ranges from $490 to $5,180 per year, depending on the category of licence, location and size of the pitch. The licence fee for a fixed pitch of cooked food or light refreshment is about $26,000 per year.
(c) The purpose of hawker licensing is to regulate hawking activities. The nature of a hawker licence is similar to that of a licence or permit for certain types of business, such as karaoke establishment permit, restaurant licence and amusement game centre licence. The main purposes of business registration are to provide the IRD with information on businesses for it to create tax files and to enable the public to obtain information on businesses for reference. It is applicable to all businesses and does not aim at regulating individual types of business. As such, the hawker licence fee should not be compared to the business registration fee.
There has been no adjustment to the hawker licence fee since 1998 and the Government is currently unable to achieve full-cost recovery for licensing. Further licence fee concessions, if any, will require more subsidy by the Government which is contrary to the "user pays" and cost-recovery principles. Therefore, the Government has no plan to waive hawker licence fee in the current financial year.
Ends/Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Issued at HKT 15:41
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