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Speech by CE at opening ceremony of Academic 3, City University (English only) (with photos/video)
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     Following is the speech delivered by the Chief Executive, Mr C Y Leung, at the opening ceremony of Academic 3 at City University today (May 6):

Pro-Chancellor (Dr Norman Leung), Chairman of the Council (Mr Herman Hu), President (Professor Way Kuo), distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,

     I am very pleased to join you all to celebrate the opening of Academic 3 of the CityU. I stand here not just as the Chief Executive of Hong Kong and your Chancellor. I am also your past Council Chairman who worked closely with the CityU team on this AC3 project. I can recall when, just a few years back, AC3 was little more than a vision. There were a few challenges. But as usual, the team, including members of the Council, worked together to get the project off the ground, and managed it to completion. Today I want to say "thank you" again to all those who have made contributions. Among them of course are the construction site workers who, I recall, had a few disagreements with others about the use of the canteens.

     AC3 will go a long way to address the space-shortage issue faced by the University. It also reminds us of how we are all constrained by the shortage of land in Hong Kong.

     Including CityU and Lingnan University, I was Council Chairman for a total of 12 years. My understanding of the land shortage problem faced by universities is probably second to none. In serving Hong Kong as your Chief Executive, I can also share this with you: whichever way we turn, we are constrained not by the lack of funding or expertise, but by the shortage of developable land. Universities, religious bodies, youth groups, old people's homes, homes for the handicapped, retailers, and of course, the average family in Hong Kong are all crying out for more space. We as a community have to make the best use of our 1,100 square kilometers of land. And that's all we have. We have to make hard choices. Not everyone will agree. Not everyone will be happy with the decisions. No one wants to see building sites outside their windows. But someone has to make decisions.

     Decision making will only be easier when we have more development land to go around. This government spends more time poring over the map of Hong Kong than any other has done. But everyone in the community will have to look at the bigger picture - the needs of society as a whole and not only their own needs.

     In my public service career, education took up more of my time than all other areas combined. The future of Hong Kong depends on the access to and the quality of education because our next generation depends on it.

     Education is a key priority on our policy agenda. We are investing serious money - and "serious money" means that roughly one out of every five dollars of government expenditure goes towards education. Our future priority will be to ensure the quality of our education.

     Hong Kong has some of the finest education institutions in the world. Last year, the Times Higher Education survey ranked three of our universities, including CityU, in the top 20 in the world for universities under 50 years old. I am very encouraged by CityU's remarkable developments and achievements. CityU embodies the "Hong Kong spirit". From humble beginnings in the Argyle Centre in 1984, this modern university has made huge progress in less than three decades. It has now firmly established itself as a leading application-oriented university. CityU has come a long way to become highly regarded as among the world's top 50 in broad subject areas of mathematics, engineering/technology and computer sciences. I would also like to congratulate the team of law students from CityU who won the prestigious Moot championship - the 20th Willem C Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot - in Vienna in March. This is no small feat - the team was competing against some of the world's top international law schools such as Yale and Harvard.

     Ladies and gentlemen, as we celebrate the opening of this new facility, we are also casting our best hopes for the future of CityU and other universities of Hong Kong. We know that, in education, it is also the people, rather than just the hardware, that count. It is also the ethos of learning, of the search and research for knowledge, rather than just the amount of funding, that counts. We know that, in education, it is also the care and attention of the wider community, and not just the university itself, that counts. In Hong Kong, we are fortunate to have universities such as CityU.

     Thank you.

Ends/Monday, May 6, 2013
Issued at HKT 17:22

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