SED on universities funding and limit of access to university campuses

     Following is the transcript of remarks by the Secretary for Education, Mr Kevin Yeung, at a media session after attending a radio programme today (November 30):

Reporter: Secretary, by pulling some of these universities' funding request, does the Government have any timetable on when these funding requests will be re-tabled to LegCo (Legislative Council)? As after this LegCo term, it will mean a start over of the legislative process. Is the Government really being fair to universities and actually bringing politics into education? Second, after the clashes at the universities, is it really doable and is it really reasonable to limit access to university campus, because universities already have security teams. So is it really necessary to look into limiting access?

Secretary for Education: On the temporary pulling out of these items from the FC (Finance Committee) agenda or the PWSC (Public Works Subcommittee) agenda, for example, for the item on the PWSC agenda, it is about a library extension and is an item led by the EDB (Education Bureau). We need more time to work with the management of PolyU (The Hong Kong Polytechnic University) to firm up the timetable and also to reconfirm the design of the whole extension before we go to the PWSC again. And for the other items which are led by the FHB (Food and Health Bureau), I think it is also their intention to resubmit the item when they have a chance to further discuss with some LegCo members to further explain some of their projects to the members. So I think it is still our target to resubmit all these proposals to the LegCo within this legislative session. Regarding the limit of access to the campus, I think it all depends on individual campuses. Some of them are very big and it may not be feasible to have a very strict control over access. But I think, the management, also together with our support, will consider all possibilities. The idea is to maintain the safety of the campus for every one of the university, including students, as well as teaching staff.

(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)