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| Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor receives the Grand Bauhinia Medal from Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying at the 2016 Honours and Awards Presentation Ceremony on Oct 29, 2016. (Provided to China Daily) |
HONG KONG - Creating quality job opportunities, a budget increase for social welfare and safeguarding the principle of “One Country, Two Systems” are priorities in outgoing Chief Secretary for Administration Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor's vision for Hong Kong.
Lam made her goals public last November when she brought up an eight-point “achievable new vision” for the city, when she was addressing a local forum on the city's future development.
Creating quality job opportunities a priority in Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor's vision for Hong Kong
Lam said the city's next leader must create opportunities for quality jobs by promoting innovation, technology and creative industries. She put great emphasis on the development of the Hong Kong Science Park and said the city’s leader should look for more land to expand it.
Focusing on the city’s future, she identified the need to help young people and attract skilled workers from overseas to meet the challenge brought by a growing aging population. Lam noticed that the university quotas were insufficient. Her solution was to give more resources to tertiary education.
In terms of poverty alleviation, Lam said the city should increase its social welfare budget. She explained that while keeping Hong Kong as a free market economy, the government should shoulder more responsibility. It should keep updating the poverty threshold – the minimum level of income deemed adequate – every year.
To keep the city prosperous and stable, Hong Kong should safeguard the principle of “One Country, Two Systems”, Lam said.
As Hong Kong's shipping and port business ranking has shrunk from the first place to fifth last year, the industry should examine how to add value by developing insurance and arbitration services, Lam said.
Meanwhile, Lam also urged the city to consolidate its strengths with determination and confidence. She highlighted the city as one of the most liberal economies and was determined to preserve the city’s advantages as a free market with a simple tax system and a free flow of capital and information.
She also valued the city as an international financial center and the biggest offshore renminbi business hub, thanks to preferential policies from the central government.
Lam said the city’s future leader should endeavor to maintain the city’s fine reputation for judicial independence, running an efficient and honest SAR government, and for being a safe,orderly society.
