Carrie Lam off to a good start

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor unveiled at the Legislative Council on Wednesday her well-deliberated plan to augment education funding with a HK$5 billion boost in recurrent expenditure. The proposal, which has received widespread support in the education sector and community at large, shows Lam's genuine understanding of the real issues our society faces and political wisdom needed in a leader of such a complex society as Hong Kong.

One major aim of the plan is to provide financial assistance to students who have met the basic Diploma in Secondary Education exam requirements to enter a government-funded university but who, due to limited places there, could not do so. There has been much criticism over the years that so many of our young people who are academically eligible for tertiary education are denied it because of insufficient resources being allocated. Last year more than 10,000 students suffered this fate. Lam tackles this old problem by providing those who refuse to give up, and opt for self-financed tertiary education, with an annual subsidy of HK$30,000 to relieve some of their financial burden. Some ask why associate degree programs are not covered but it is still a very important step to help more young people obtain the quality education they deserve.

Another key factor in education is teachers, which Lam has not forgotten. She has apparently heeded the teachers' associations' repeated requests and promised to create more than 3,000 additional permanent teaching posts in primary, secondary and special schools. Such a move would provide much-needed job security to teachers and reduce their workload as their overloading unavoidably affects teaching quality.

Lam's choice of education as the target of her first initiative is by no means arbitrary. Education is intrinsically important and it is all the more significant nowadays when our economy is transforming into a knowledge-based one, and when a well-educated workforce is necessary to fend off fierce competition coming from nearby economies that are fast catching up.

Lam must have known the greatest hurdle in putting her plan into practice is in obtaining cooperation from the Legislative Council, where opposition lawmakers have delayed countless government funding applications in the past through their infamous filibustering tactic. And time is not on her side either as the legislative year ends later this month. But she also knows that increasing education funding is something the opposition could not find any excuse to block, especially after she has carefully consulted all related parties over the proposal.

A good beginning is half of success. Let us hope the Lam administration will go from strength to strength and help Hong Kong relive its glory as she has promised.

(HK Edition 07/06/2017 page8)