Category: MIL-OSI

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

     The Financial Secretary, Mr Paul Chan, arrived in Doha, Qatar, yesterday (September 27, Doha time) to begin his visit there. He met respectively with the President and Chair of the Board of Directors of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), Ms Zou Jiayi; Qatar’s Minister of Finance, H.E. Ali bin Ahmed Al Kuwari; and a number of political, business, financial, investment and corporate leaders in Qatar to exchange views on deepening co-operation.

     During his meeting with Ms Zou, Mr Chan had an in-depth exchange on issues including deepening co-operation between the two sides, promoting regional infrastructure development and sustainable development, and making better use of Hong Kong’s strengths in financial markets, professional services and talent. Mr Chan welcomed the AIIB’s establishment of an office in Hong Kong, and looked forward to expanding co-operation between the two sides to areas such as catastrophe bond issuance, green and transition finance, technology and innovation, and talent training.

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region – 4

The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:

     The Hospital Authority (HA) today (September 28) expressed heartfelt appreciation to DBS Bank (Hong Kong) Limited (DBS Hong Kong) and Manulife (International) Limited (Manulife Hong Kong) for their generous joint donation of $1 million to the Oasis – the Centre for Personal Growth and Crisis Intervention (Oasis), under the HA for enhancing mental health support for healthcare workers.
 
     Oasis provides professional counselling and related services to HA staff members to support and improve their mental wellness. Through the launch of the “myOasis” mobile application, Oasis further offers a diverse range of digital mental health resources, including information on mindful self-compassion and sleep hygiene. The donation will be used to enhance the “myOasis” mobile platform, improving the coverage and accessibility of mental health resources and psychological support services for HA staff members and allowing them to obtain timely assistance when needed.
 
     The HA spokesperson said that HA staff members are the cornerstone for the effective operation of public healthcare services, always shouldering the vital mission of safeguarding public health. In the face of challenges posed by increasing demand for healthcare services, the HA attaches great importance to and care for the physical and mental wellbeing of healthcare staff, helping staff members take care of their own mental wellness while dedicating themselves to protecting the health of the public. The HA will continue to strengthen support for its staff and enhance the psychological resilience of healthcare workers in order to provide safe, high quality, and patient-centred public healthcare services to the general public of Hong Kong.
 
     The HA expresses its appreciation to the generous donation from DBS Hong Kong and Manulife Hong Kong.

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region – 4

     The Government released today (September 28) the Long Term Housing Strategy Annual Progress Report 2026 (Progress Report).
 
     According to the established methodology for projection under the Long Term Housing Strategy (LTHS), the gross total housing demand for the next 10-year period is 419 300 units. Hence, the Government set the supply target at 420 000 units. 
 
     “Since the LTHS annual update in 2018, the public/private split of the new housing supply has been adjusted to 70:30. Balancing the Government’s commitment to substantially increase the public housing supply to meet the social demand and the demand for private housing, the Government will maintain the public/private split of the new housing supply at 70:30 for the next 10-year period from 2027-28 to 2036-37. Accordingly, out of the total housing supply target of 420 000 units, the public housing supply target will be 294 000 units and the private housing supply target will be 126 000 units,” a spokesman for the Housing Bureau said.
 
     “In the LTHS Annual Progress Report 2024, we announced that to further meet the public’s home ownership needs, the public housing supply would be planned with a gradual move towards a 60:40 ratio between public rental housing (PRH)/Green Form Subsidised Home Ownership Scheme (GSH) units and other subsidised sale flats (SSF). The Government will continue to advance in this direction in the next decade. Correspondingly, the public housing supply target of 294 000 units will comprise 176 000 PRH/GSH units and 118 000 other SSF units,” the spokesman added.
 
     Solving the housing problem tops the agenda of the current-term Government. Through the current-term Government’s unremitting efforts to “enhance speed, quantity, quality and efficiency”, a solid foundation for public housing production has been laid, and the programme is now entering its harvesting phase. This shift has enabled faster fulfilment of the public’s housing needs. The Composite Waiting Time for Subsidised Rental Housing has been shortened from the peak of 6.1 years before the current-term Government took office to 4.8 years, which is the lowest level in over eight years for two consecutive quarters, moving towards the target of reducing it to 4.5 years in 2026-27. Since the current-term Government took office (i.e. from July 2022 to June 2026), more than 85 500 applicants have been housed to PRH. Meanwhile, the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) and the Hong Kong Housing Society (HS) have also offered approximately 48 000 SSF units for sale, representing a significant increase of nearly double that of approximately 25 000 new SSF units offered for sale in the previous four-year period prior to the current-term of Government (i.e. from July 2018 to June 2022). In fact, since the current-term Government took office (i.e. from July 2022 to June 2026), more than 133 000 families have been housed to PRH or have purchased SSFs offered for sale by the HA and HS, representing a significant increase of over 35 per cent as compared to approximately 97 000 families in the previous four-year period prior to the current-term of Government (i.e. from July 2018 to June 2022).
 
     In the next 10 years, the Government has identified sufficient land to meet the public housing supply target of 294 000 units. The Government will strive to provide more than 35 000 public housing (including PRH and SSF) units per year on average in the next five years (i.e. from 2027-28 to 2031-32), representing an increase of about 73 per cent compared with the five-year production since the current-term Government took office, the highest in the past 25 years. In addition, compared to the five-year period at the start of this Government, the supply of Home Ownership Scheme flats has increased significantly by approximately 100 per cent over the original projections. As in the past, when planning public housing development, the Government will maintain adequate flexibility to ensure that the public housing production can be adjusted in a timely manner in response to changes in the actual circumstances.
 
     As for private housing, the supply target in the coming decade is 126 000 units. The Government will have sufficient land to meet the target in the next 10 years. Besides Government land sales, other sources of private housing land supply include railway property developments and Urban Renewal Authority projects, as well as private development projects. As regards private housing supply in the shorter term, based on the latest projection as at end-June 2026, the supply in the primary private residential property market for the coming three to four years is about 96 000 units. 
 
     With the continuous increase in the public housing supply, the Government has more room to further enhance various housing policies to better address the public’s housing needs. To this end, the Housing Bureau has announced four key directions for future housing policy in the Progress Report:
 
(i) further encourage citizens to move up the housing ladder;
(ii) enhance SSF;
(iii) eradicate substandard subdivided units and implement the Basic Housing Unit regime in an orderly manner; and
(iv) persistently promote the use of building technologies to enhance cost-effectiveness in construction, thereby ensuring the smooth implementation of the public housing programme.
 
     Details of relevant measures are set out in the Progress Report on the Housing Bureau’s website at www.hb.gov.hk/eng/policy/housing/policy/lths/index.html.
 
     According to the supply-led and flexible principles under the LTHS, the Government updates the long term housing demand projection annually and formulates a rolling 10-year housing supply target. The gross total housing demand takes into account the housing demand derived from the following four components:
 
 (i) net increase in the number of households;
 (ii) households displaced by redevelopment;
 (iii) inadequately housed households; and
 (iv) miscellaneous factors.

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region – 4

​The Department of Justice (DoJ) announced today (September 28) the launch of a one-month stakeholder consultation on the proposed legislative amendments to the Arbitration Ordinance (Cap. 609) (AO). This consultation is a policy initiative under the First Five-Year Plan for Economic and Social Development of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2026-2030), as well as one of the indicators for specified tasks in the 2026 Policy Address announced by the Chief Executive on September 16. The DoJ has taken swift action to implement the relevant initiative, demonstrating its determination to drive policy implementation efficiently. This consultation is also part of the DoJ’s ongoing efforts to enhance Hong Kong’s arbitration legislative framework and consolidate its position as a premier international arbitration hub.
 
A spokesman for the DoJ said, “The proposed legislative amendments mark a significant step forward in ensuring that Hong Kong’s arbitration framework stays at the forefront of international development. Guided by the core principles of enhancing speed, convenience and finality, protecting confidentiality, making arbitration more readily available to resolve various types of disputes, ensuring fairness and justice, and respecting party autonomy, the reform aims to bolster Hong Kong’s competitiveness as a leading international arbitration centre. Ultimately, these enhancements will attract more businesses to choose Hong Kong as their seat of arbitration and enable them to benefit from our enhanced arbitration legislative framework that keeps pace with the times, and our internationally recognised arbitration services.”
 
In October 2025, the DoJ established the Working Group on Arbitration Law Reform (Working Group), chaired by the Secretary for Justice, Mr Paul Lam, SC, with the Deputy Secretary for Justice, Dr Cheung Kwok-kwan, as the Vice-Chairman. Comprising experts from the legal and dispute resolution services sectors, the Working Group was tasked with reviewing and making recommendations to amend the AO to ensure Hong Kong’s arbitration regime remains up-to-date, efficient, and aligns with international best practices. Following a comprehensive review by the Working Group, the DoJ is commencing a stakeholder consultation today on the recommendations of the Working Group and the draft amendment bill.
 
Based on the recommendations proposed by the Working Group in respect of 25 issues, the DoJ has formulated a range of legislative amendment proposals to the AO, categorised into the following four key areas: (i) speed and convenience; (ii) confidentiality; (iii) scope; and (iv) fairness and justice. For details of the recommendations made by the Working Group on the 25 issues, please refer to the Annex.
 
To ensure that a balanced and representative range of views is collected, the consultation paper will be issued to relevant stakeholders, including legal professional bodies, arbitral institutions, dispute resolution and law-related bodies, arbitration practitioners and legal professionals, Government advisory bodies and departments, statutory bodies, academics, chambers of commerce, trade associations, banks and wealth management associations, and other commercial end-users of arbitration services. The consultation period will run until October 27.
 
After considering the views of the stakeholders, the DoJ targets to introduce the amendment bill into the Legislative Council in early 2027, striving to complete the legislative amendments for AO within 2027.

Source: Hong Kong Government special administrative region