Jeff Lam joins district council election, seeking your support.

[JEFF LAM YUET]

Dear Friends,

After all these years of serving our lovable community and estates, I have decided to join the coming district council election. Thanks to the nomination of residents and I have been qualified to be candidate no. 1 of the election. I have been working in the community for nearly 5 years and I hereby sincerely seek your support by spending 10 minutes on the election day to support my future community works. Please kindly come to vote on the 6th Nov, 2011. Your support and help are highly appreciated.

TOGETHER, WE CAN BUILD A BETTER TUNG CHUNG!

Warm Regards,
Jeff Lam
PS: Due to legal requirements, this is an election promotion message and I cannot reply message here. Please PM me for any concerns. Thanks.

[garyhk]

Where does your funding come from for all this activity?

[charles]

you know you're living on a landfill do you? If you want a beach (and a bit of fresh air) just walk across the hills (or cab, or bus)
tung chung north is not a location to sit on a beach.
as for your hotels, neither of the 3 cater for locals, it's only aircrew and layover passengers
citygate is not a shopping mall, most clothes 'outlets' sell their old lines, or stuff that didn't make the quality check

[JEFF LAM YUET]

Hi my friends, I am sorry that I cannot often reply message here due to legal requirements. As a candidate, I must report all message and even a "like" on Facebook to the government and there are many legal requirements limit my communication. Thx for your understanding.

As for the funding, since I don't belong to any political party, I so far pay everything from my own pocket, and each candidate has a limitation of hk$53800 for this election. I have heart to contribute my time and resource to this community, and I hope to have your support for my community services. Thx.

For different demands, we have to seek balance for things, and I will put my effort to make Tung Chung a reasonably better place. Thx.

Warm regards,
Jeff Lam Yuet

PS: please forgive me that I may not be able to reply as below during this election period.

[CCCL]

citygate is not a shopping mall, most clothes 'outlets' sell their old lines, or stuff that didn't make the quality check

And most of the 'discounts' are totally bogus. 'Original' prices are marked up to laughable levels, then 'cut' by some large percentage to attract the feeble minded. Result is overpriced crap merchandise that must do wonders for the manufacturers' margins. 

Sorry for thread hijack - back to important discussion of DC election:

I saw a banner a while ago from two candidates proposing to increase the number of taxi licenses for Lantau. The banner said there were only 50 licensed taxis in Lantau. That seemed low until I remembered some of the epic waits I've had at HKG for a Lantau taxi (I noticed that they have removed the sign near the Lantau taxi queue which had a number to call for a taxi...). Jeff, I hope you support this measure too. We need more blue taxis.
 

[garyhk]

Jeff, in addition to supporting the taxi issue I hope that you will change your views about the rights of domestic helpers to gain permanent residency.

It is regrettable that so many people object to domestic helpers qualifying for permanent residency.  Just like any other worker invited to this territory, if they qualify then they should be allowed residency.  I had to do certain things to get mine and I was happy to do so.  It is not an automatic process and there are various qualifying criteria.  However, just to stop them because they are domestic helpers from overseas is completely and unforgivably wrong.  You have stated in your newsletter that you oppose this human right.  False claims about HK being swamped by helper relatives of helpers can be argued to be racism by some.  I might not go that far BUT I fail to understand what is the objection.  If HK people want to invite foreigners to come here and be their servants, then HK people should expect to honour the quid pro quo of that arrangement and to consequently support those people if they then move their lives here and qualify for residency.  Putting up false barriers is just wrong. [HK people = people who live in HK]. 

Just to be clear, I believe that this is NOT the same issue as mainland pregnant women overwhelming the local facilities. But again, if a mainland pregnant women has the right, i.e. by way of marriage to a HK man, then they should be accommodated.  This is all part of the cost of making HK such a delightful place to live.

This may not be the most appropriate thread for this, but I can't see where else to raise this.

[charles]

I fail to understand why this is a 'human right' ? the law states DH's don't qualify for residency so let's follow the law instead of wasting tax payers money. The law also says you have to stop for a red traffic light and can go for a green, how long until someone challenges that? They're only making life difficult for themselves, soon enough they'll be allowed 3 consecutive 2 year contracts and then no visa extension for 1 year. They'll probably go challenge that as well.
 

[CCCL]

I fail to understand why this is a 'human right' ? the law states DH's don't qualify for residency so let's follow the law instead of wasting tax payers money. The law also says you have to stop for a red traffic light and can go for a green, how long until someone challenges that? They're only making life difficult for themselves, soon enough they'll be allowed 3 consecutive 2 year contracts and then no visa extension for 1 year. They'll probably go challenge that as well.
 

The issue is that the HK law regarding who qualifies for residency is in violation of the Basic Law. That is what the court decided. Since there is no way Beijing will allow even the possibility of a large 'foreign' community gaining residency here, they will simply 'interpret' the Basic Law to say that HK can exclude helpers. So you can relax - there will be plenty of tax payers money to waste invest in pointless valuable infrastructure.

[charles]

just look at the old continent what happens if you let everybody in for free.
I don't mind if they are (or aren't) allowed residency, I just don't see the point. Many work hard and send most salary back home for a good living and schooling, and probably hope to go back as soon as the kids have finished their education. The ones that would like to stay and get their residency will be more than happy to go work in a restaurant or supermarket instead of being a domestic helper. Whose jobs are they taking up?

[CCCL]

Whose jobs are being taken by the thousands of no/low-skilled mainlanders arriving in HK every year?

It would be pleasant (as a person who only speaks english, and barely at that) to be served in a restaurant or helped in a supermarket by someone who actually spoke decent english, so I wouldn't mind seeing filipinos take some of those jobs. But I admit that's only my selfish perspective, so don't bother pointing out that I could also learn canto since that is the majority language, I'm too lazy to do it. 

Anyway, residency for long-serving DHs will never happen (see above), so the entire discussion is moot.

[garyhk]

Interesting points made above...

My view is that if someone like me can qualify for residency here then there is no good reason to exclude someone else who has also come here to work, exactly the same as me, just because they have come here to provide domestic help and so be excluded is just plain wrong.  It is intrinsically wrong.  Domestic helpers contribute just as much, in their own way, as I have done to HK's society.  So to exclude them the opportunity to apply for residency is, as I observe, just wrong.  Besides all this, there are hurdles to get over in the application for residency as I am sure people know.  It is not just applying and getting it. One has to centre one's life here, draw up wills, make investments, involve in society by doing voluntary work and the like, etc, etc etc.  One has to make some effort to qualify fir residency BUT just to deny people even the chance to apply because of what they do for HK people doesn't sit right with me, anyway.  Others will disagree and that is what is great about this 'free' society.

The mistakes made in the old continent are adequately addressed here with the 7 years of contribution to society before application can be made - if Europe adopted this approach then most of the invasion problems would not have arisen I suspect.  Mind you the European Human Rights Act and its application is another hot bed of nonsense that is a factor but for sure we don't want to get into that here.

enjoy...

[charles]

tend to disagree with your last paragraph. The problems arising now is from the folks that came working in the heavy industries in the 60's and after. They were permitted to stay but then wanted citizenship. Once they got that the gates were open and nothing to stop them any more. the whole Europe thing is now properly messed. You call a fart smelly and you get done for racism...

there's also a difference in 'qualifying for residence', no?

for CCCL Chinese migrating into a Chinese city? Just be happy it's still more or less regulated. You had 13 years notice Hong Kong was becoming a part of China 

[CCCL]

Yes, a Chinese city - of course it always has been. But the point was, whose jobs were being taken by incoming no/low-skilled workers. And while we're on the subject, how much of the 'affordable' housing crunch is due to flats in public housing going to newly arrived comrades from the mainland? It's not just wealthy mainlanders who want in. There's a lot of putonghua spoken out in Yat Tung and in Tin Shui Wai.

Gary - getting a PID card was pretty much a snap, as I recall. Just filled out the form, showed them 7 years of tax returns (and some bank statements? not sure about that), and I was in. The authorities may well rue the day I got that card, but that's another story....

Let's get back on point, and support Jeff, shall we?

[CCCL]

Jeff - is it on your instructions that your campaign workers outside Citygate are ignoring non-Chinese members of the community when handing out your campaign literature? I found it kind of offensive.  If that's not your instructions, I think you'd better talk to them before they alienate even more potential voters.

[JEFF LAM YUET]

Hi my friend,

I am sorry to hear this. Since I don't want to give difficulty to the management office of Coastal Skylie and Citigate as well as their security staff, I agree not to present myself at the bridge, so I have organised some helpers, who are all local residents to handle the promotion over there. As you know that I always appear in this forum to share idea with people around the world, I also printed all my materials in both Chinese and English including the flyers they are distributing, I won't have any differences between races. Since all helpers are all volunteers and we are lack of helpers given that I don't have strong human resource and financial support from any party, I sincere apoloyise for any misunderstanding and hereby seek multicultural volunteers to join our election team, in order to provide better services to our residents. Meanwhile, I will try my best to organise at least one English speaking helper at each point of service. Thx again for giving me valuable advice.

Warm Regards,
Jeff