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The following is issued on behalf of the Executive Council Secretariat:
Following is the transcript of remarks by the Convenor of the Non-official Members of the Executive Council, Mr Leung Chun-ying, at the Main Wing lobby, Central Government Offices today (June 16):
Leung Chun-ying: I want to announce through the media on behalf of all my non-official colleagues of the Executive Council that in accordance with the announcement of the Chief Executive that the Chief Executive¡¦s salary and the political appointees¡¦ salary will be reduced on July 1 by 5.38 percent, I will take the same amount of pay cut voluntarily.
Reporter: (inaudible)
Leung Chun-ying: That¡¦s a much more complicated figure than that.
Reporter: What¡¦s your response to Legislators for example who say that 5.38 percent is not enough ¡K
Leung Chun-ying: It is a reference figure. As far as the non-official members are concerned, it is not a salary, it is an honorarium. Unlike LegCo members, we do not have any kinds of subsidy or subvention. For example, whenever we employ and there are quite a few of us who do employ public services assistants, the costs of employing public services assistants are not reimbursable. So it is an entirely different system. In many cases, as far as I know, many of my non-official colleagues, including myself, are out of pocket every month before the voluntary reduction because we don¡¦t claim expenses at all and we pay these expenses after we pay Inland Revenue Department salaries tax.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Issued at HKT 14:18
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