The Secretary for Education, Ms Tsai Ruo-lin, held a press conference on Tuesday (August 23) to announce a series of facilitation measures to assist Hong Kong students entering the Mainland, including the inclusion of Hong Kong students in the "Humanistic Care Channel" quota at the Guangdong-Hong Kong land border crossing, increasing the number of travel between Hong Kong and the Mainland Passenger flights in the city, as well as discussions with Macau to allow Hong Kong students to transfer to other mainland provinces and cities after being quarantined locally, and the Ministry of Education will also coordinate arrangements for institutions to retain the qualifications of late students and conduct online classes.
The introduction of this measure is very close to or even later than the start date of some mainland colleges and universities.
In addition, Cai Ruolin reminded: "Because of urgent matters, the notice period will be very short, so students should be prepared to leave at any time", and affected students need to complete the form on or before Friday (August 26). The electronic form application, which only takes about three days to prepare, and the uploading of student identification documents, has to say that the whole thing is very urgent.
Cai Ruolin announced that Hong Kong students who need to go to higher education institutions in the Mainland can fill in the form before August 26, and the authorities will notify special arrangements as soon as possible to assist them in returning to the Mainland.
(Photo by Lu Yiming)
It's time to prepare early for sudden needs
In fact, as early as last month, some local political parties were concerned that the entry quota restriction would affect students going to the Mainland to register for a degree or continue their studies as scheduled, and put forward a number of suggestions.
Although many of the practices of the Hong Kong government today are similar, it seems that the Hong Kong government has not yet fulfilled some of the demands. For example, DAB Education Spokesperson and Legislative Council Member Guo Lingli pointed out at that time that the government needs to grasp first, etc. The number of people studying in the Mainland, however, officials have recently said that they do not seem to have the latest detailed figures.
The arrangement for Hong Kong students to go to the mainland is of course not something that the SAR government can decide unilaterally. Moreover, as the epidemic in Hong Kong heats up during the same period, the Hong Kong side encountered obstacles in the process of coordinating with the mainland authorities, making the measures hurriedly implemented. It's a no-brainer.
However, if the Hong Kong government officials were prepared at first, they did not assume that the epidemic would stabilize or spread little, and contacted the mainland authorities to start discussions in advance, I believe the result would be better than today.
No one, including a group of experts, can say for sure how the epidemic will develop in the next few months. However, it is foreseeable that before and after the school's winter vacation or internship period, there will inevitably be a large number of similar clearance needs.
The Hong Kong government should not wait for the society or political parties to speak out at that time. Instead, it should make good use of this experience and make "advance arrangements" for students to return to the mainland and Hong Kong, so as to avoid the recurrence of a large number of students rushing to apply for government assistance. .
On July 8, the daily customs clearance quota in the mainland increased to 2,000, and a large number of citizens waited in line at the Shenzhen Bay Port.
Temporary measures cannot replace regular arrangements
On the other hand, the arrangement for students to be included in the "humanistic care channel" this time is not a regular measure. In the long run, the authorities still have to deal with various problems that hinder the smooth "customs clearance" of citizens.
For example, the "reverse isolation" plan originally proposed by the DAB, one of its intentions is to solve the difficulties of students going to colleges and universities in the Mainland, and to avoid their high transportation and hotels by allowing local "health station" isolation. cost burden.
The case that can best prove that overcoming the difficulties of the system is more important than making temporary arrangements. Earlier, a local organization arranged for the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge shuttle bus (Jimba) to send Hong Kong students to Taishan. Some of them actually did not agree with the mainland because of the CT value after arriving in Po. Standard was sent back to Hong Kong.
Just recently, there was news that during the discussion between the Hong Kong government and the mainland on the "reverse isolation" plan, the other party expressed concern that Hong Kong's entire epidemic prevention system is different from it. One of the concerns is precisely the difference in diagnosis standards between the two places.
In order to fundamentally facilitate the exchanges between mainland and Hong Kong, officials of the Hong Kong government need to demonstrate to the mainland that "reverse isolation" is feasible, such as plugging the loopholes in the closed loop shown in the earlier quarantine hotel taxis to pick up the street passengers, and arranging compliant Quarantine sets serve as local "health stations", etc.
Regarding the "scalper" speculation that cannot be stopped by real-name ticket purchases, it is also necessary for the authorities to contact the transportation or hotel operators involved to see if they can take further measures such as restricting repeated bookings or registering accounts with real names, in order to reduce the public's inconvenience. Reasonable transit costs.
The epidemic is heating up, worrying about breaking through 10,000 loopholes, it is necessary to strictly reverse the isolation, and the mainland customs clearance to recover the economy and prevent and control the epidemic should not be wrong