西九聯席核心成員陳偉群就西九發展意見書的有關討論的回應.
1. How did PPWK come up with this draft?
This draft was the culmination of PPWK’s work so far since the inaugural seminar on 27 November:
The consensus position of “暫停三揀一, 全民全速再規劃” at the 12.12 forum
Three questionnaire studies of PPWK, including the third questionnaire with over 500 (?) respondents
Dozens of PPWK voluntary docent services for the WKCD exhibition
The 1.23 forum, including more intellectual discussions and break-out workshops
Numerous individual focus group discussions with PPWK members who took part
Countless face-to-face meeting and email exchange/debates among PPWK core members
Yet this is not the final draft. PPWK remains committed to engaging with civil society – including PPWK’s own members and other groups – on refining this proposal. It is a genuinely “living and organic process”.
2. Has PPWK made any deal with the government/Donald Tsang?
In every one of the public forums, the government has been invited to attend (the level of attendance has descended from Shelley Lee at 12.12 to Lolly Chiu at 1.23 and Vincent Fung at 2.20). Individual core members have had meetings with Donald Tsang himself, clearly as part of government’s own lobbying strategy. But there has not been a meeting of Donald Tsang with PPWK – whether with all PPWK members at a public forum, or with PPWK core group.
We always stand ready to engage with the government as one of the stakeholders. But there has never been any negotiation, not to speak of horse trading or deal making.
3. Has PPWK backtracked from its previous stand?
PPWK’s stand is best encapsulated in “暫停三揀一, 全民全速再規劃”. The current draft is fully consistent with this position.
In our current draft, we have reinforced the message of暫停三揀一. We can spell this out more clearly.
Our position has never been 推倒重來. We have consistently asked for integrated planning with the full participation of civil society, which is precisely the essence of the current draft.
To be true to the spirit of 全民全速再規劃, we must not prejudice the outcome by specifying any option, or even planning concepts. Hence our proposal has focused more on process and institution – again, the concept of “living and organic” process, rather than a preconceived outcome.
4. Is this a proposal to save the dying WKCD project? Why do you not simply kill it off?
There is one thing we agree with Donald Tsang, namely, that innovative thinking is needed. However, we reject his “innovative thinking” of giving culture to the developers. Instead, we propose an innovative – even revolutionary – approach in cultural development, urban planning and governance.
The vision is to develop Hong Kong into a cultural metropolis, hence our “cultural vision” and “urban planning vision”.
To turn that into reality, we need a suitable “policy bureau” and an “implementation agent or department”, which will be guided by full civil society participation.
However, there is nothing in the current system (of 11 policy bureaus and various departments, statutory bodies and advisory bodies etc) which can bring this about.
Our proposal of “CMTT plus WKCD authority” is to fit this revolutionary concept into the current structure as best as we can. This will be extremely difficult, but at least it is do-able and it gives HK community as a whole a “fighting chance” to realize our vision.
5. Questions about CMTT:
How to form the CMTT, who is to appoint the members, and why should CMTT be put under the CS?
Who are CMTT’s members? How to ensure their independence? Where do they get legitimacy?
What is to become of the CMTT?
The CMTT has the important task of guiding the WKCD Authority. The latter, as an implementation agent, must come under some authority within government. Both, therefore, has to fit into the government structure, so that the government as a whole is made accountable for the whole WKCD.
We have examined carefully the 11 bureaus and concluded that none of them is appropriate to “house” the CMTT. Given the cross-bureau nature of CMTT, and the present dysfunctional relationship among bureaus, putting it under any single bureau would not work. That leaves us with only the CE or CS. We draw no conclusion on whether it should be CE or CS, but CS would be logical since he has been given the task from the start.
It follows that constitutionally CMTT members would have to be appointed by the CE or CS. For the CMTT to work, however, its members must not be “government’s men” (or “Donald’s men”). Rather, a system will have to be devised to select or elect CMTT members, to ensure that they are representative. CMTT’s legitimacy will come from the broad representation and expertise which they comprise. We have emphasized the tripartite nature of CMTT, but we have not provided details on is composition, which can be further discussed and debated.
As said in the paper, CMTT itself may evolve along with the development of our governance structure. The whole of the 11 bureaus and of government will need to be re-structured one day, and by then CMTT may become one of a few super-bureaus. Again, we have no pre-conceptions and draw no conclusions, but would leave that to evolve itself (living and organic!). The important thing is that
CMTT is something that can be done easily, right now;
it can work, and if it does, it is here to stay, and it can evolve further;
it can facilitate the “revolutionary change in governance”.
6. Questions about WKCD Authority:
How autonomous is WKCD Authority? To what is it accountable?
What is the interface between CMTT and the WKCD Authority?
As said above, CMTT is almost like a policy bureau to the WKCD Authority, providing the “policy guidance” to the actual work of the WKCD Authority.
For the WKCD Authority itself, as said in the paper, it is to be tripartite, with civil society participation, another “living and organic” structure. Therefore, while structurally it is accountable to the CS (or CE), it is substantively accountable to the sectors represented, the various stakeholders, and “community” at large. How this can come about is again a matter of design of its governing structure, for which more discussion is needed.
It should be emphasized that both CMTT and WKCD Authority do not deal just with West Kowloon. WKCD is their “flagship project” but their role is to effect cultural and urban development for the entire territory.
In our earlier draft we have a somewhat elaborate structure of the tasks and possible institutions under the CMTT/WKCD Authority. Perhaps we should re-instate those diagrammes to provide illustration.
7. Questions about governance
In terms of governance, ultimately, who decides? How does the policymaking process work?
What is the relationship between different stakeholders?
Ultimately accountability lies with the CS or CE, i.e. the government. The merit of our proposal is that the government decision-making process is tied in with civil society participation, i.e. there is a structural mechanism to ensure that 長官意志 will not prevail.
As to how different stakeholders interact, it is a mark of mature civil society for different interests to engage, debate, compete, and balance with each other, through rational debate, analysis, and a democratic process of decision making. CMTT provides just the right forum for that.
8. On relationship with existing structures
How does the new structure fit into existing governance structure, e.g. LegCo, LCSD, ADC, etc? Does PPWK have no confidence in current institutions, otherwise, why not reform them?
Will there be too many agents, if the CMTT structure is added without reforming the current structure?
We do indeed have no confidence in the current institutions, from the days of the Urban Council to the CHC. That is why we have proposed the novel idea of CMTT.
See the “background” section of our proposal on the shortcoming of the current system. Neither the structure nor the process works.
WKCD does represent a vision to change the cultural landscape fundamentally. The problem is that the vision started wrong, by concentrating only on the hardware and the economic (real estate) equation. If by killing off WKCD, we go back to the present structure, and nothing changes, then we are no better off.
The WKCD concept presents an opportunity to inject new life into cultural and urban development. PPWK’s view is to grasp this opportunity, but start from a different vision than Donald Tsang’s: from a revolutionary process using a simple and practicable institutional change (CMTT etc).
The initial driver of this brand new process will have to be WKCD itself, but as CMTT, it must of necessity affect the working of the current institutions (LCSD, ADC etc). At the beginning, however, both will co-exist. In the fullness of time, CMTT will have to take on the long-overdue structural transformation of the entire dysfunctional “LCSD+ADC” structure (i.e. really do what CHC has failed to). But this should be given time to happen (living & organic!)
LegCo’s role can be ensured in the composition of CMTT and WKCD Authority – this is implied in PPWK’s proposal. The committee under Alan Leong can be made a permanent feature in LegCo to “shadow” the CMTT/WKCD Authority.
9. About the icon
Has PPWK fallen into the same trap as government in its conception of “iconic architecture”, as real estate-led, with tourism mind-set, focusing on super-big structures?
Why do icons have to be big?
What about sustainable development aspect? Being energy-saving and environmentally friendly?
Absolutely true, that icons do not have to be big. The PPWK paper explicitly says that the cultural development is itself an icon, thus casting doubt on the need for a big canopy.
Agree completely with the need for sustainable development considerations.
We preserved the wording of the “canopy” in the spirit that we should rule nothing out. Since there is no necessity to presume that the Foster Canopy must be an option, this should be made clear in our proposal.
We have mentioned a 5% as being the ceiling on the cost of the icon. It is doubtful now whether this is necessary.
10. On WKCD cultural venues
Has the PPWK fallen into the same trap as government in thinking “big is beautiful”, by endorsing the clustering concept?
Will clustering crowd out existing venues?
True to the “living organic” concept, the placement of venues must not be totally haphazard, nor totally planned. They should not be randomly dispersed, not totally concentrated.
We have explained in the paper why we endorse a clustering concept. But clustering does not necessarily contradict with a dispersal strategy. They are two different aspects of the planning for a cultural metropolis.
What this means is that there should be some cluster in WKCD – for such a prime site in the harbour front, we believe it reasonable to endorse such a cluster. But it does not mean the cluster has to be big.
In fact, it will be a requirement of CMTT, in the overall planning, to take account of other venues in other districts, for a wholistic development of cultural venues in Hong Kong. The “crowding out” of other venues may thus not be a worry at all.
As an example – without necessarily indicating PPWK’s preference – it is conceivable that we build the first phase of WKCD with a small cluster of cultural venues, on 20% of the land, but leaving the rest as a huge green park, which could be part-developed for later phases or become a permanent harbour front park, depending on the aspiration of the community and the result of the collective planning for the harbour front.
11. On cultural content
Culture is not just about icon and spending; where is cultural capacity building?
The Current HK cultural scene is not clear from PPWK’s plan, what kind of investment is needed, for what kind of culture?
Is PPWK’s cultural vision too ambitious? Without the cultural competence, does HK have the condition?
Devoid of cultural content, should we set more modest objectives?
Agreed entirely with the need for cultural content to be a built-in and integral part of cultural planning. This is precisely what CMTT should undertake.
However, we disagree that the cultural vision is too ambitious, or that HK lacks cultural competence, or that we do not the condition for “greatness”. We do not take a narrow view of “culture” being defined by the “cultural sector”. Our starting point is a vision of Hong Kong as a “cultural metropolis”, a Chinese city with a “metropolitan culture”. Obviously, we do not have the same standard of “cultural competence” measured by conventional indicators (audience numbers, cultural events attendance, museum spending, etc) but this is to be expected if it is accepted that culture is a “living thing”, and that Hong Kong has a unique positioning given our unique social, economic and political status.
Leaving aside the debate over HK’s cultural greatness or mediocrity (a worthy debate in itself), we are all agreed that the current institutions do not serve our cultural development, nor will the real estate-led model of WKCD. Hence our novel idea of CMTT. It is to go beyond the conventional government policy-making and to reflect upon our pluralistic cultural content. Surely, many comprehensive cultural studies will be required (hence think-tank!), and a clear alternative on cultural issues is needed besides venue creation for the actual WKCD development.
12. How to finance WKCD
Using land sales for culture is not normal way of government spending. Is it realistic to ask for it?
If not land sales, how to find the money to build the cultural venues?
How to generate recurrent income to support WKCD’s cultural part?
At the end of the day, our proposal amounts to earmarking some land sale proceeds for cultural development (both hardware and software). This is unconventional as it amounts to hypothecation which government, as a matter of policy, does not adopt.
However, this again illustrate the need to apply the right kind of “innovative and revolutionary” concepts in public governance. The government model is in fact a disguised form of hypothecation, using the developers as medium (and rewarding them along the way). The PPWK proposal, however, is built upon a community-wide consensus over the way ahead for culture and urban planning. At the actual construction stage, the WKCD authority will have to become a statutory body, and by then there would have to be legislation giving legal status to the financial arrangement. In other words, the financial arrangement is part of the uniqueness of the whole concept. If it works and has the support of the community, and is enshrined in the law, it need not upset the present public finance system.
13. Planning and development aspects
How to balance and settle the interests of the developers? After all, they have a legitimate interest.
How to determine the development intensity?
On what basis are the land-use to be determined?
If development is to be broken down in stages, how to integrate the construction of different stages?
The actual monetary value of WKCD depends on the development intensity (overall plot ratio), for which it is a matter of good urban planning to settle on. An integrated planning concept will have to apply, but again, playing on the “living” theme, the details do not all have to be worked out all at once. What is needed is an overall concept plan with a development intensity agreed to by the community, and then detailed land-use planning for the first phase (20% or 25%) – plus detailed planning on cultural development!
Although the Town Planning Board remains the statutory body to make plans and approve development proposals, the complexity of the task of planning for WKCD itself, and the need for public legitimacy, would beg a CMTT-like concept.
The need to break down into different phases is self-evident if the project is to become genuinely a “living and organic” one. This is why a WKCD Authority is needed. The URA provides an illustration (though it is not the best of examples): It has three major projects in Wanchai, which in a de facto sense are three different phases of Old Wanchai’s development which need to (and can) be coordinated.
As to the basis for determining land use, while a whole new public engagement process is needed, the years of planning that has gone into WKCD should not be dismissed. In planning for various uses, the concept of integrated harbour planning must be a guiding principle.
14. Timetable
Is timetable realistic?
Why do we need to rush on WKCD?
Engaging the public means more and more public consultation; when is there enough public consultation?
There is no need to rush. If it is to be a project truly for Hong Kong society, we should let the community decide its pace. Hence (for the umpteenth time) living and organic!
On the other hand, there is no need for undue delay. In the government’s model, there will be nine-months of black-box negotiations between government and developers. In our proposal we advocate that this should be replaced by the CMTT public engagement process. It will be up to the public to decide how much we want to expedite the WKCD development.
Public consultation is not public engagement. The latter takes time, but it makes the public a owner and stakeholder. It is important to note that the biggest delays are often caused by bad decisions and poor governance, not by the public.
15. On the percentages on the spread of resources in the PPWK proposal, what is the basis of these percentages?
The figures are not arbitrary. They are based on the earlier HKU study on financing for WKCD. We are not presenting them as definitive figures but we believe it is a useful starting point for discussion.
16. How do we link WKCD development to local heritage and cultural space elsewhere in the territory?
We have to emphasise that the spirit of our proposal is to go beyond the physical location of West Kowloon, even though we recognize that West Kowloon provides a “driver” for cultural and urban development. It is a way to drive the development of HK’s cultural policy, which must include a heritage policy and a policy on public space. The latter has been emphasised in the proposal.
17. What is the end-game of our proposal?
We have deliberately not provided a definitive “end-game” for CMTT and WKCD authority. By logic we cannot, if it is to be “living and organic”.
It is possible, though, to envisage how these will evolve. It is logical, for instance, for CMTT to become the main cultural policy advisory board of government, with tripartite composition similar to the Harbour Enhancement Committee, and then become a new policy bureau in a reformed government with less number of bureaus.
The WKCD Authority, on the other hand, may become a harbour authority covering the entire harbour front. Or it could become a cultural development authority with more venues coming under its wing. These will depends on how the various cultural facilities along the harbour front will be integrated. It is also a choice between a multi-manager approach over various arts and culture facilities across the territory and a single-manager approach, with pros and cons in each approach which should be debated. It is premature to set a specific end-target for these living institutions.
18. Is there a danger of government “stealing” PPWK’s proposal to pursue its own agenda?
This is a common tactic of governments across the world. Any alternative proposal may be so manipulated by the government for its own purposes. So this risk should not be regarded as the reason for not putting up anything. On the contrary, if our position is simply to oppose any WKCD, then it is even easier for government to manipulate our stance by accusing PPWK as trouble making and unconstructive, hence eroding our wider public support.
19. What is Save Donald again?
Scheme of Absurd Vain Extravagance: Development Of New Art & Leisure District
20. How much hair is left of PPWK core members after all the hair-pulling in developing the PPWK proposal?
See Danny Yung