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Written by: Commentary Editing Room
2021-03-30 06:30
Last update date: 2021-03-30 06:30
The Federation of Trade Unions recently proposed the "New Era and New Labor Movement" program. Chairman Wu Qiubei even published a long article in the newspaper to explain the content.
The obvious difference between this program and the previous party's position is that it clearly stated the two targets of attack, one is the anti-China chaos in Hong Kong, and the other is the real estate consortium, and called the government to stop "secretly helping" the consortium and implement political and economic reforms.
The Federation of Trade Unions did point out many chronic diseases in Hong Kong, but they were not accurate enough in terms of diagnosis and solutions.
More importantly, the Federation of Trade Unions has lost popular support in recent years. I am afraid it is not optimistic whether the New Deal can unite the people again.
As a deep-seated contradiction in Hong Kong, land and housing issues can be described as a major source of grievances among the people in Hong Kong.
The Federation of Trade Unions pointed out that "Hong Kong is not lack of land, but insufficient development of residential land." Then it proposed to break the monopoly of land resources and vigorously develop land to build housing. The solution is for the government to get rid of the entangled interest relationship with the real estate consortium and to punish it. Real estate developers who have left unused private land for a long time; as for the existing housing policy, the Federation of Trade Unions also proposes to limit rent increases.
No shortage of land but only housing
The Federation of Trade Unions uses emotional expressions such as "real estate hegemony", "Hong Kong's development lifeline is controlled by real estate developers and consortia", and even "not working for any capitalist". It is inevitable that people think that the pro-China political group wants to expand the class. struggle.
However, leaving political disputes aside, land hoarding by real estate consortia is indeed one of the causes of the housing supply problem in Hong Kong. It is also reasonable to ask the government to formulate land and housing policies, resolve the plight of Hong Kong people with real estate developers, and improve livelihood security.
However, some of the land and housing reform proposals made by the Federation of Trade Unions are not fully in line with the overall well-being of Hong Kong.
For example, it advocates finding 10% of the land in country parks to build houses with low ecological value, doubling the average living area, and opening the country park before reclaiming brownfields and agricultural land is afraid of creating social controversy.
On the other hand, many people support the long-term recovery of the right to use the land of the indigenous inhabitants of the New Territories to build houses, but the Federation of Trade Unions did not mention it.
In fact, many small-house lands reserved for development have been initially leveled, and multi-storey housing can be built as long as supporting facilities are added. If the establishment can push the government to release these lands, the general public will surely live in peace.
The development of the border areas of country parks for land development has always been controversial in society.
(Profile picture)
Lessons to be learned from past performance
In addition to remediation of land and buildings, the Federation of Trade Unions also put forward proposals for patriots to govern Hong Kong, develop smart cities, strengthen cooperation between Guangdong and Hong Kong, and share development results for everyone.
None of these main themes are wrong, but it is by no means easy to reconsolidate social support in the post-anti-revision era.
Judging from the current situation, it seems that the Federation of Trade Unions, like other establishments, did not learn from the legislative turmoil and the defeat of the district council elections. It still shirks all the responsibility for social tearing to the democrats.
The truth is that they often misjudged people’s sentiments in the past, and they did not stand on the side of the people on a number of livelihood policies, such as opposing collective bargaining rights and refusing to increase men’s paternity leave to seven days, showing disappointment.
In addition, Wu Qiubei stated in the interview that the Federation of Trade Unions is willing to participate in governance through various channels. However, what the society sees is that He Qiming, a member of the Federation of Trade Unions, has taken the lead in becoming the Deputy Director of the Bureau of Labor and Welfare. He has joined the accountability team for about nine times. In the past few months, it was unable to promote the Federation of Trade Unions' proposals such as unemployment assistance, and was denounced by party mate Guo Weiqiang in the Legislative Council for ignoring the plight of the unemployed.
I would like to ask the members of the Federation of Trade Unions who have high ambitions in the Labour and Welfare Bureau, and deviate from the wishes of the general public. How can they convince the public that they can also reflect public opinions in other positions?
On June 1, 2020, He Qiming became the Deputy Director of the Bureau of Labor and Welfare.
(Photo by Zhang Haowei)
Hong Kong people have long looked at politicians and political groups with slogans and different words and deeds. The Federation of Trade Unions is now proposing the "New Era and New Labour Movement", especially for the housing problem. This move is worthy of recognition.
However, after a lot of fanfare and determination to shake the chronic disease, the society can only listen to what it says and watch what it does.
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The Federation of Trade Unions He Qiming (Federation of Trade Unions) Wu Qiubei 01 Viewpoint
