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Following is a question by the Hon Lee Wing-tat and a written reply by the Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands, Mr Michael Suen, in the Legislative Council today (November 9):
Question:
According to the internal guidelines issued in May 2004 by the Government, government departments and trading funds may consider a tender bid for service contracts (excluding construction services) which rely heavily on the deployment of non-skilled workers only if the monthly wage rates undertaken to be offered by the tenderer to such workers are not lower than the average market rates. Besides, The Link Management Limited ("The Link") has taken over from the Housing Authority the day-to-day management of 180 retail and car-parking facilities since March 1 this year. After the listing of The Link Real Estate Investment Trust ("The Link REIT") in the next few months, The Link will become an independent private company and thus will not have to follow the above guidelines. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) among the non-skilled workers currently employed by contractors of The Link, of the number of workers whose monthly wage rates are higher than the average market rates, and the number of those with monthly wage rates lower than the average market rates, together with a breakdown by job type of the latter's average monthly wages; and
(b) whether, after the listing of The Link REIT, The Link will be required to fulfil its corporate social responsibility by engaging only those contractors who offer wage rates not lower than the average market rates to their non-skilled workers; if not, of the justifications for that, and the other measures to ensure that the wages of such workers will not be lower than those offered to workers employed by contractors of government departments and trading funds?
Reply:
Madam President,
My reply to the two-part question is as follows:
(a) Before the listing of The Link Real Estate Investment Trust (The Link REIT), The Link Management Limited (The Link) is the Housing Authority's wholly-owned subsidiary, and is responsible for the day-to-day management of the 180 retail and carparking facilities to be divested. Before the listing, the relevant outsourced service contractors are still appointed by the Housing Authority. There is no contractor directly employed by The Link.
At present, these contractors employ some 6 200 non-skilled workers to serve the Housing Authority's retail and carparking facilities to be divested. They comprise about 4 600 security guards and about 1 600 cleansing staff. Among them, the new requirement stipulated by the Government since May 2004 for monthly wages for non-skilled workers has now covered about 65% of the security guards and about 96% of the cleansing staff.
As regards the other workers, the contracts of the relevant contractors were signed before mid May 2004, when the new requirement had yet to be in place. Most of them do not provide for a requirement on wage rates. The Housing Authority therefore does not have the average figures of the monthly wages of these workers.
(b) Upon the listing of The Link REIT, The Link will become a private company completely independent of the Government and the Housing Authority. Like other private companies in the market, The Link will decide on its own whether to require its contractors to offer wage rates not lower than the average market rates to their non-skilled workers. The Government will not interfere.
In his 2005-2006 Policy Address, the Chief Executive appeals to the business community, in the spirit of corporate social responsibility, to follow the level of average monthly market wages announced by the Government in paying their non-skilled workers. We have extended that appeal to The Link. The Link has indicated that, in realising its established business strategy and plan, the company will actively respond to the Government's appeal by taking appropriate measures. Such measures will include requiring the contractors to provide reasonable remuneration for their workers in order to provide quality service. The Link will conduct from time to time anonymous interviews with the workers of these contractors to better understand their actual situation and take follow-up action when necessary.
Ends/Wednesday, November 9, 2005
Issued at HKT 12:15
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