Report 53 advisory bodies

Improving Advisory Body Operations

Advisory and statutory bodies provide a suitable platform for views and for voices to be heard and for responses to be given. How can Hong Kong's present system be improved?

A plan to appoint more 18-35-year-olds to serve on advisory and statutory bodies (ASBs) was announced in the 2017 Policy Address with the ostensible aim of increasing the overall ratio to 15% by 2022. However, as of December 2019, the proportion had risen to only 11.6%.

Key points from respondents

● 72.9% believed young people such as themselves could bring about change through participation. ● 27.1% expressed interest in self-nomination for certain advisory government committees.

Ø 55.6% wished to do so mainly to represent other youth.

Ø 54.2% wished to do so mainly to influence policy-making. ● When asked how they would rate the ASBs’ current performance in three basic functions, respondents gave the following rankings:

Ø enhancing the legitimacy of policy: 5.55

Ø collecting professional views: 5.52

Ø encouraging public participation: 5.28 [On a scale of 10 indicates excellent performance and 0 indicates poor performance.]

Key points from individual youth interviews

● Taking part in the work of advisory bodies is meaningful because:

Ø they provide a platform for rational discussion

Ø it is possible to express opinions directly to the government

Ø it provides a chance to become more familiar with the operations of government

Ø young members can learn from the experienced senior members

Ø it allows an outlet for innovative ideas ● Interviewees currently serving on advisory bodies expressed concern about

Ø time management issues that would make it difficult to continue serving in the near future

Ø peers who doubted the significance of any contribution they made on ASBs

Ø lack of promotion of work of ASBs leading to misapprehensions among the general public about their performance

Comments from Youth I.D.E.A.S. think tank group members

Ansel Lam “A review of the role and functions of ASBs is overdue but the last one took place in 2003. The city has experienced many changes since then and the government should explore new out-of-the-box approaches, collecting views from members of the public in various walks of life.” Vivian Leung “To facilitate youth engagement in advisory committees, we would like to see the government and society join hands and promote a suitably friendly workplace culture. This should allow up to four hours of leave each month to attend meetings for public affairs participation.” Dennis Leung “We recommend the establishment of a government support platform for young ASB members to clearly define their role increase their influence.”

Report No.53 HKFYG Youth I.D.E.A.S. Governance group Published title Improving Operations of Advisory Bodies to Better Facilitate Youth Engagement Respondents 524 young people aged 18-35 Interviews 18 youth, 8 of whom are current members of advisory bodies, plus three experts or academics More details in Chinese yrc.hkfyg.org.hk/2020/09/14/yi053/ Enquiries Sharon Cheung 3755 7039