Month: February 2026

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

     Following is a question by the Hon Tang Ka-piu and a written reply by Secretary for Housing, Ms Winnie Ho, in the Legislative Council today (Feb 25):
 
Question:
 
     Some residents of On Kay Court in Ngau Tau Kok have reflected that the works consultancy firm engaged by On Kay Court for the major maintenance works of the housing estate is the same as the one engaged by Wang Fuk Court in Tai Po, and the persons in charge of the firm are now involved in judicial proceedings, thus plunging the works at On Kay Court into a standstill and a supervision vacuum and arousing residents’ concern about safety and works progress. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
 
(1) whether the Government and the Urban Renewal Authority will, in view of the situation concerning the maintenance works at On Kay Court above, consider intervening by adopting the following measures: (i) deploying qualified civil servants or designating independent professionals as works consultants; (ii) ‍entrusting qualified third-‍party organisations to monitor the work of the existing works consultancy firm or introducing other special options as support, and (iii) if it is necessary to engage a new contractor, stepping up the monitoring of the new contractor to ensure that the services it provides are professional, safe and compliant with the law and prevent the works from being left uncompleted;
 
(2) as it has been learnt that the Owners’ Corporation (OC) of On Kay Court will have to hold a general meeting regarding its major maintenance arrangements, but some residents are worried that the inadequate participation of certain owners (especially non-occupier owners who have leased their units) will affect the quorum of the meeting and the decision-making progress, whether the Government has conducted any assessment in this regard and adopted any measures to assist the housing estate in relaunching the works;
 
(3) whether the Independent Checking Unit under the Housing Bureau has participated in the screening of works contractors and consultancy firms by OCs of housing estates developed by the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA), as well as the assessment and monitoring of the business competence and integrity of the relevant companies;
 
(4) whether it plans to undertake reforms in order to strengthen the Housing Bureau’s support for housing estates under the Tenants Purchase Scheme (TPS) and the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) in the areas of building management and maintenance works or even directly intervene in these aspects; if so, of the specific measures and the timetable; if not, the reasons for that;
 
(5) of the total number of TPS and HOS estates in Hong Kong which have received a repair order issued by the Government under the Mandatory Building Inspection Scheme in the past five years, with a breakdown by maintenance works progress (i.e. works in progress, works completed and works not yet commenced); of the number of housing estates among them which have engaged the same works consultancy firm and contractors as Wang Fuk Court;
 
(6) as HA possesses property ownership in some HOS and TPS estates, whether HA will assume a more leading role in building maintenance works projects in the future by exercising its voting rights as an owner and directly participating in the relevant decision-‍making process; if so, of the details; if not, the reasons for that;
 
(7) regarding those HOS estates which have been completed for quite some time but have not yet formed their OCs, whether the Government will take targeted follow-up measures and initiate the provision of legal, administrative and technical support for them, so as to expedite their formation of OCs and in turn facilitate the maintenance and repair of such housing estates;
 
(8) of the total amount of subsidies offered to eligible owners every year since the introduction of the Mandatory Building Inspection Subsidy Scheme; and
 
(9) whether it has inquired into the number of housing estates which have received works consultancy services from the works consultancy firm involved in the major maintenance project of Wang Fuk Court in the past two years, and whether those projects have applied for and received government funding; if so, of the housing estates involved; as the works of those housing estates may be plunged into a standstill as in the case of On Kay Court, of the support and response arrangements put in place by the Government in this regard?
 
Reply:

President, 

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

     Following is a question by Professor the Hon Chan Wing-kwong and a written reply by the Secretary for Health, Professor Lo Chung-mau, in the Legislative Council today (February 25):

Question:

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Financial Secretary Paul Chan today said the Government has earmarked resources for support work after the Tai Po fire and for community care, such as increasing the number of vouchers under two elderly care service schemes.

Delivering his 2026-27 Budget today, Mr Chan said the Government has provided comprehensive support for people affected by the Tai Po fire.

He added that the Government has just announced the long-term housing arrangements and earmarked $4 billion accordingly.

The Government also proposed to allocate $300 million to the Urban Renewal Authority to launch an enhanced version of “Smart Tender” in the second half of this year, and to provide subsidies to encourage owners to utilise the scheme’s paid services to reduce the risk of bid-rigging in building repair works. 

Mr Chan also noted that the Government will earmark $3 billion for the Development Bureau to conduct a comprehensive review of Operation Building Bright 2.0 to draw up a new subsidy scheme.

Furthermore, the Government will allocate $1 billion to extend the Lift Modernisation Subsidy Scheme.

Beginning in the next financial year, the Government will increase the number of Community Care Service Vouchers for the Elderly by 4,000 to 16,000 and the number of Residential Care Service Vouchers for the Elderly by 1,000 to 7,000, with estimated full-year expenditures of $1.2 billion and $1.97 billion respectively.

Meanwhile, the Elderly Health Care Voucher Pilot Reward Scheme will be extended by two years until end 2028.

Elderly persons who have accumulated voucher spending of $1,000 or above within the same year on specific primary healthcare services, such as examinations and chronic disease management, are eligible for a $500 voucher reward. Mr Chan said the measure will involve an additional expenditure of about $1 billion.

The Government will also implement new arrangements for portable cash assistance in the middle of this year, under which elderly participants of the Guangdong Scheme, Fujian Scheme and Portable Comprehensive Social Security Assistance Scheme may opt to receive government assistance directly through their accounts with designated Mainland banks.

Regarding support for youth, the Financial Secretary said the Government will introduce a new media thematic internship programme in the Mainland and allocate an additional $60 million toward implementing the Funding Scheme for International Youth Exchange under the Home & Youth Affairs Bureau continuously.

The Government will also provide around 3,600 short term internship placements in government departments and public bodies for post-secondary students.

Mr Chan also announced that the annual funding for the Women Empowerment Fund will be increased to $30 million from the next financial year.

To support persons with disabilities, the Government will enhance rehabilitation services by providing about 450 additional places for day, residential and pre-school services in the next financial year, involving an additional annual expenditure of about $107 million. 

For school children receiving On-site Pre-school Rehabilitation Services, the Government will provide bridging and support services during their first term in primary school, involving an additional annual expenditure of about $260 million.

Meanwhile, the provision for the Re-employment Allowance Pilot Scheme will be increased to $222 million in the coming financial year.

Regarding healthcare service enhancements, Mr Chan said the Government will further develop primary healthcare in the community by launching the Primary Healthcare Co care Network, which will extend screening to include hepatitis B and other diseases, strengthen cross disciplinary collaboration, and improve support services such as medical laboratory testing and diagnostic radiology. 

The target participation for the first five years is for around 700,000 individuals, he added.

The Government will also implement the community drug formulary and launch the community pharmacy programme in the second half of this year.

To enhance the price transparency of private healthcare services, the Government will introduce the relevant regulation to the Legislative Council this year.

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Financial Secretary Paul Chan today announced several measures to integrate technological and industrial innovations through key infrastructure projects, including Hetao Hong Kong Park and San Tin Technopole.

Through tripartite co-operation, the Government intends to channel land and corporate resources towards target industries for priority development in Hong Kong. Encouraging greater participation in innovation and technology by the business sector will expedite development of the Northern Metropolis.

Planning for Phase 2 of Hetao Hong Kong Park is complete and the Government will seek Legislative Council approval to inject $10 billion into the park company to accelerate development..

To create a comprehensive industrial ecosystem, the Government will establish a dedicated company this year with the aim injecting $10 billion to move forward with development of the San Tin Technopole.

 

Aerospace collaboration

The finance chief said today that Hong Kong is well-positioned to connect the Mainland’s aerospace industry with global markets by providing professional services in research and development (R&D), financing and risk management.

The Office for Attracting Strategic Enterprises will take the lead in identifying and attracting aerospace firms to establish a presence in the city. To further support the sector, the Government has requested Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing to review listing requirements to facilitate the entry of aerospace enterprises into the local capital market.

Driving RISC-V innovation

The Hong Kong Investment Corporation is actively promoting the R&D and industrialisation of RISC-V technology through strategic investments and the establishment of the Hong Kong RISC-V Alliance.

The alliance aims to leverage this open-source technology to foster cross-industry co-operation among academia, industry and the investment sector within the Greater Bay Area and international markets.

Advancing emerging technologies

The Government is accelerating the commercialisation of new materials with two startups set to launch production lines at EcoPark this year and the third InnoHK research cluster, establishing new R&D centres focused on advanced manufacturing and sustainability.

To the foster the next wave of artificial intelligence (AI), the Government and the Hong Kong Investment Corporation are building a robust ecosystem for embodied AI.

Strategic investment

The Financial Secretary said today that the Government is currently selecting managers for its $10 billion Innovation & Technology Industry-Oriented Fund, with operations set to begin this year to channel market capital into strategic fields like life and health technology and AI.

To further bolster cross-boundary collaboration within the Greater Bay Area, the Government will also review and enhance tax arrangement for R&D expenditures.

Patient capital

The Hong Kong Investment Corporation has invested in over 190 projects to date. As the initial $62 billion capital has been largely allocated, the Government will arrange capital injections to further promote industry clustering and the development of frontier technology.

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Overall consumer prices rose 1.1% year-on-year in January, a smaller increase than the 1.4% year-to-year rise recorded in December, the Census & Statistics Department announced today.

Netting out the effects of the Government’s one-off relief measures, the underlying inflation rate was 1% in January, also less than that seen in the previous month.

Compared with January 2025, year-on-year increases in prices were recorded in the following categories: electricity, gas and water; miscellaneous services; alcoholic drinks and tobacco; miscellaneous goods; transport; housing; and meals out and takeaway food.

Meanwhile, year-on-year decreases were logged for durable goods; clothing and footwear; and basic food.

The Government said that the smaller increases in January were mainly due to the high base of comparison stemming from the Chinese New Year taking place in January last year, while the 2026 Chinese New Year fell in mid-February.

It added that price pressures on various major components remained largely contained in general.

Looking ahead, external price pressures are expected to largely stay moderate, but domestic costs may rise as the Hong Kong economy continues to grow. Nevertheless, overall inflation should stay mild in the near term.

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Financial Secretary Paul Chan said today in his 2026-27 Budget that the Government will continue to promote the integrated development of culture, sports and tourism to provide a better urban living experience for residents and visitors.

In the coming year, the Government will allocate $1.66 billion to the Tourism Board. The board will scale up its flagship events and promotions, introducing new elements, extending the duration of events, and organising more signature festive events to highlight Hong Kong’s East-meets-West uniqueness.

Building on the success of last year’s “Immersive Light Show in Central”, which featured spectacular 3D light shows, the board will launch a brand-new show focused on the theme of light festivals. It will be held at various locations at different times of the year and will replace “A Symphony of Lights”.

To attract high-end overnight visitors, the Tourism Board will step up marketing efforts in source markets with good potential, including Mainland cities outside Guangdong, and emerging markets such as Association of Southeast Asian Nations countries and the Middle East. 

Hong Kong will also continue strengthening co-operation with the Greater Bay Area and other Mainland provinces and municipalities, and exploring options for multi-destination flight itineraries with airlines.

On revitalising historic buildings, Mr Chan said the Government will earmark additional funding of $1 billion for the Built Heritage Conservation Fund to carry on its work.

Following the opening of the Eastern Section of the East Coast Boardwalk in North Point at the end of last year, the 13km-long harbourfront from Kennedy Town to Shau Kei Wan has now been fully pedestrianised.

Adhering to the incremental approach taken in enhancing the harbourfront, the Government plans to conduct a consultation on the construction of a pedestrian walkway at the praya in Kennedy Town in the second quarter of this year. Following the phased opening of a waterfront site near Hung Hom Station this quarter, Kowloon’s harbourfront promenades will extend to about 15km in length.

To support the “tourism is everywhere” ethos and promote “urban-rural integration”, the Budget proposes allocating $200 million to launch the “Northern Metropolis Urban-rural Integration Fund” as a pilot scheme. The scheme aims to encourage non-governmental organisations and relevant bodies to take forward rural tourism projects and bring economic vitality to rural villages.

With regard to sports, the Government will allocate more resources to promote sports in the community, support elite sports, maintain Hong Kong as a centre for major international sports events, enhance professionalism in sports, and develop sports as an industry.

It will inject $1.2 billion into the sports portion of the Arts & Sport Development Fund to further promote sports development, including strengthening training for team sports athletes, improving the professional standards of coaches, and bringing more diverse and higher-level sports competitions to Hong Kong.

Meanwhile, as part of its ambition to develop Hong Kong into a global trading hub for “premium” arts, the Government is due to finalise the details of its collaboration with Art Basel over the coming five years.

To strengthen Hong Kong’s position as one of the world’s top three arts trading centres, the Government has initiated a study focused on exploring areas such as financing and talent development. The study is expected to be completed this year.

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Financial Secretary Paul Chan revealed that in 2025-26, the Government’s Operating Account will return to a surplus ahead of schedule and is expected to register a surplus throughout the period from 2026-27 to 2030-2031.

Mr Chan observed that overall, the Government’s public finances have seen significant improvement.

Delivering the 2026-27 Budget Speech today, Mr Chan noted that the Budget last year introduced a reinforced fiscal consolidation programme with the aim of achieving fiscal balance.

Over the past year, on top of its full commitment to implementing the programme, the Government also saw an increase in revenue from stamp duties and profits tax, by nearly $50 billion in total, compared to the original estimate.

As a result, in 2025-26, the Operating Account will return to a surplus ahead of schedule, while the Consolidated Account will be broadly balanced after taking into account the net proceeds from bond issuance.

In the medium term, Mr Chan said the Capital Account will nevertheless still record a deficit annually, mainly due to a high level of capital works expenditure. 

As infrastructure projects are an investment in Hong Kong’s future, the Government will meet the financing needs by suitably increasing bond issuance. 

Fiscal consolidation

The Financial Secretary said the Government will follow through with the fiscal consolidation programme by strictly containing the growth of operating expenditure.

Specifically, it will take forward the Productivity Enhancement Programme as planned, to cut the recurrent expenditure by 2% in both 2026-27 and 2027-28. Such moves will deliver further savings of about $7.8 billion and $15.6 billion respectively over 2025-26.

The plan will be launched on the premise that the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance, Social Security Allowance and statutory expenditures will not be affected, Mr Chan emphasised.

The civil service establishment will be reduced by 2% in each of the coming two financial years to an estimated level of about 188,000 posts by April 1. As a result, a cumulative total of over 10,000 posts will be deleted within the current-term Government.

Mr Chan said the Government will uphold the “affordable users pay” principle in raising revenue.

The rates of stamp duty on residential property transactions valued above $100 million will be raised from 4.25% to 6.5%, affecting about 0.3% of residential property transactions. 

It is estimated that revenue will increase by about $1 billion per year. The measure will take retrospective effect from tomorrow upon passage of the amendment bill by the Legislative Council.

The Government will also optimise the use of its financial resources. Funds established outside its accounts will be consolidated with a view to bringing back about $15.8 billion to the Government’s accounts in 2026-27.

To optimise the use of the Bond Fund’s surplus, the Government will introduce a resolution to LegCo to enable the transfer of the accumulated fund surplus to the Consolidated Account in 2026-27.

In addition, Mr Chan proposed transferring $75 billion in each of the coming two financial years, totalling $150 billion, from the Exchange Fund to the Capital Works Reserve Fund. The $150 billion in transfer will support the Northern Metropolis and other infrastructure projects.

Bond issuance

The Government’s capital works expenditure is estimated to be about $128 billion for 2026-27. As the Government will accelerate the development of the Northern Metropolis and other economy and livelihood related works projects, it plans to raise the total borrowing ceiling of the green bonds and infrastructure bonds programmes, from $700 billion announced last year to $900 billion. 

During the Medium Range Forecast period, the ratio of government debt to Gross Domestic Product will rise from 14.4% to 19.9%, which, Mr Chan said, is a highly prudent level and well below that of most advanced economies.

Proceeds from bond issuance will be used to invest in infrastructure only, but not for government recurrent expenditure, he emphasised.

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

Financial Secretary Paul Chan said today the main purpose of the Exchange Fund is to defend Hong Kong’s financial stability and its financial system.

The 2026-27 Budget proposed to transfer $150 billion from the Exchange Fund to the Capital Works Reserve Fund in the coming two years to support the Northern Metropolis and other infrastructure projects.

At the Budget press conference this afternoon, Mr Chan explained the rationale behind the transfer and emphasised that it is a safe play.

“Last year, the Exchange Fund made an investment income of over $300 billion. Now we are transferring from the Exchange Fund, about half of it, $150 billion, in two installments commencing from 2026-27.”

“Having regard to the current size of the Exchange Fund, which is over $4,100 billion, and considering that we are just taking half of their income earned last year, back to the Government, also for investment purposes, we do think this is a considered, prudent move,” Mr Chan added.

“We are very confident that given our various measures in place and the strong buffer of the Exchange Fund, we would be able to weather any volatility or even attack to our financial system.”

Source: Hong Kong Information Services

In his Budget speech today, Financial Secretary Paul Chan said the revised estimate of total government revenue in 2025-26 is about $688.8 billion, higher than the original estimate by 4.5%. Fiscal reserves are expected to be $657.2 billion at end-March 2026.

Supporting citizens, enterprises

To relieve the economic pressure faced by citizens and enterprises, Mr Chan – having taken into account the Government’s fiscal position this year – proposed a number of measures in the 2026-27 Budget:

(a) provide rates concession for domestic properties for the first two quarters of 2026-27, subject to a ceiling of $500 for each rateable property ‒ this measure is estimated to involve about 3.15 million domestic properties and reduce government revenue by about $3.1 billion;

(b) provide rates concession for non-domestic properties for the first two quarters of 2026-27, subject to a ceiling of $500 for each rateable property ‒ this measure is estimated to involve about 440,000 non-domestic properties and reduce government revenue by about $400 million;

(c) reduce salaries tax and tax under personal assessment for the year of assessment 2025-26 by 100%, subject to a ceiling of $3,000 ‒ the reduction will be reflected in the final tax payable for the year of assessment 2025-26, benefitting about 2.12 million taxpayers and reducing government revenue by about $5.3 billion;

(d) reduce profits tax for the year of assessment 2025-26 by 100%, subject to a ceiling of $3,000 ‒ the reduction will be reflected in the final tax payable for the year of assessment 2025-26, benefitting about 171,000 businesses and reducing government revenue by about $500 million; and

(e) provide an allowance for eligible social security recipients, equal to one month of the standard rate Comprehensive Social Security Assistance payments, Old Age Allowance, Old Age Living Allowance or Disability Allowance, while similar arrangements will apply to recipients of the Working Family Allowance, altogether involving an additional expenditure of about $6.5 billion.

In addition, starting from the year of assessment 2026-27, the Budget proposed:

(1) increasing the basic allowance and single parent allowance from $132,000 to $145,000, and the married person’s allowance from $264,000 to $290,000, benefitting about 2.09 million taxpayers and reducing tax revenue by about $3.56 billion a year;

(2) increasing the child allowance and additional child allowance from $130,000 to $140,000, benefitting about 360,000 taxpayers and reducing tax revenue by about $680 million a year; and

(3) increasing the allowance for maintaining a dependent parent or grandparent, and raising the deduction ceiling for elderly residential care expenses ‒ these measures will benefit about 830,000 taxpayers and reduce tax revenue by about $970 million a year.

Specifically, the allowance for maintaining a dependent parent or grandparent aged 60 or above will be raised from $50,000 to $55,000. The same increase applies to the additional allowance for taxpayers residing with these parents or grandparents.

Meanwhile, the allowance for maintaining a dependent parent or grandparent aged 55 to 59 will be increased from $25,000 to $27,500. The same increase applies to the additional allowance for taxpayers residing with these parents or grandparents.

Furthermore, the deduction ceiling for elderly residential care expenses will be adjusted, from $100,000 to $110,000, for taxpayers whose parents or grandparents are admitted to eligible residential care homes.

Government revenue

On government revenue, Mr Chan said: “Due to a buoyant equity market and an accelerated economic growth, the revenue estimate from stamp duties is revised to $99.5 billion, an increase of about $31.9 billion from the original estimate. Revenue from profits tax has increased by about $16.8 billion while that from salaries tax remains stable, with the revised estimates at $209 billion and $97 billion respectively, demonstrating the strong resilience of Hong Kong’s economy.

“However, as the residential property market has just stabilised while the commercial property market remains relatively sluggish, government revenue from land premium stays low with the revised estimate at $17.5 billion, lower than the original estimate by $3.5 billion.”

Government expenditure

The finance chief said the revised estimate of total government expenditure for 2025-26 is $789.2 billion, lower than the original estimate by $33.1 billion. Of this, recurrent expenditure is $572.4 billion, lower than the original estimate by $15.7 billion.

The Operating Account for 2025-26, which was originally estimated to record a deficit of about $3 billion, will register a surplus of $51.3 billion. The Capital Account will record a deficit due to low revenue from land premiums, coupled with high capital works expenditure to cater for the accelerated development of the Northern Metropolis and other public works projects.

Factoring in the issuance of government bonds of $155 billion and repayments of $51.7 billion, it is expected that the Consolidated Account will register a surplus of $2.9 billion instead of a deficit of about $67 billion as originally estimated.

Separately, the major policy initiatives announced in the 2025 Policy Address involve $7.4 billion in operating expenditure, $32 billion in capital expenditure and $20 billion in financial commitments. There will be about $1.3 billion in revenue forgone. The financial implications of such initiatives have been reflected in the estimates for 2026-27.

Total government expenditure for 2026-27 will increase by about 6.9% to $843.4 billion, with its ratio to nominal gross domestic product projected to be 24.2%.

Recurrent expenditure for 2026-27 will increase by 4.8% to $599.7 billion. Of this, substantial resources will continue to be allocated to livelihood-related policy areas including healthcare, social welfare and education, involving a total of $357.1 billion and representing about 60% of recurrent expenditure. Non-recurrent expenditure will increase by 36.9% to $40.5 billion.

Total government revenue for 2026-27 is estimated to be $765.2 billion. A consolidated surplus of $22.1 billion is expected for the year, and the fiscal reserves will rise to $679.3 billion.

Medium Range Forecast

In the Medium Range Forecast spanning 2026-27 to 2030-31, a real economic growth rate of 3% is adopted. The finance chief expects that there will be a surplus in the Operating Account for each of the next five years, while the Capital Account will still record a deficit due to expenditure on infrastructure. After taking account of net proceeds from the issuance of bonds, the Consolidated Account will register a surplus in each of the next five years.

Fiscal reserves are estimated at $733.7 billion by the end of March 2031, representing 17.3% of gross domestic product, or equivalent to about 10 months of government expenditure, he added.