Deputy President, first of all, I have to declare that I was elected by fellow Members of the Legislative Council to represent the Legislative Council as a member of the Council of The Chinese University of Hong Kong (“CUHK”).

Deputy President, the Liberal Party supports the passage of the Post Secondary Colleges (Amendment) Bill 2025, which provides for a unified regulatory framework for all institutions operating local self-financing programmes at the degree and sub-degree levels, with a view to enhancing governance, accountability and transparency. Yet, we are concerned about the transitional matters faced by the self-financing arms of five publicly-funded universities established under their respective enabling ordinances.

At present, post-secondary education (i.e. education after the secondary level) in Hong Kong comprises two parts: publicly-funded and self-financing. On the publicly-funded side, as we all know, the University Grants Committee provides funding for eight universities to operate degree programmes in Hong Kong. Among others, the University of Hong Kong (“HKU”) and CUHK, etc. are internationally renowned; their common feature is that they have their respective enabling ordinances and are regulated under them.

 In contrast, there is a rather confusing situation in the self-financing sector: Firstly, there are currently 11 institutions registered under the existing Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance (including 3 private universities and 8 colleges) offering local self-financing degree and sub-degree programmes in Hong Kong. Besides, there are another seven institutions registered under the Education Ordinance which offer sub-degree programmes. At the same time, there are also five self-financing arms of publicly-funded universities established under their respective enabling ordinances which offer self-financing degree and sub-degree programmes.

Deputy President, the reason for such a situation of self-financing post-secondary education in Hong Kong is due to historical factors. Before the passage of the Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance, post-secondary education in Hong Kong was only provided by HKU, which was established by the University Ordinance 1911. After the Second World War, Hong Kong’s population grew rapidly, giving rise to a keen demand for education. After the founding of the New China, a large number of scholars and teaching staff who had originally operated universities in the Mainland moved south to Hong Kong. Owing to restrictions of the laws at that time, they were unable to resume the operation of their schools under the name of “university”, and could only continue to operate by registering as private secondary schools in the name of “college” or other names in accordance with the Education Ordinance. In view of the aforesaid situation, the British Hong Kong Government passed the Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance in 1960 to formally establish the approved post secondary colleges which are distinguished from universities and secondary schools. Subsequently, three colleges, namely New Asia College, United College and Chung Chi College, were merged to form CUHK by means of The Chinese University of Hong Kong Ordinance.

The Baptist College, Lingnan College and Chu Hai College, etc. were then upgraded to colleges through the Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance and continued to operate independently. In addition, there were still a wide range of institutions continuing to provide self-financing post-secondary education programmes under the Education Ordinance, with vocational training and education being the most common among others. Since then, the tripartite situation of the enabling ordinances of universities, the Post Secondary Colleges Ordinance and the Education Ordinance has been established for post-secondary education.

On the other hand, the example of publicly-funded universities establishing self-financing arms under their respective enabling ordinances was first seen in the Department of Extra-Mural Studies of HKU, which was established in 1957. The Department of Extra-Mural Studies of HKU was renamed as HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education in 1992. In response to the policy on sub-degree education implemented by the SAR Government, HKU established the HKU SPACE Community College in 2000 to provide sub-degree programmes. To date, a total of five publicly-funded universities have established self-financing arms under their respective enabling ordinances. Among them, three universities (there are only three universities at present) still have their degree-awarding and self-financing arms, namely HKU, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (“PolyU”) and Hong Kong Baptist University (“HKBU”), which offer self-financing sub-degree programmes and other self-financing degree programmes in the light of the SAR Government’s policies.

The above brief review serves to illustrate that the source can be traced for the complexity of the current situation of self-financing post-secondary education. This also fully reflects the long-standing fine tradition of being flexible and adaptive, committed to education and supportive of government policies in Hong Kong. The Administration’s current objective of unifying the regulatory framework for self-financing post-secondary education through the Bill is understandable, and it is a manifestation of its active pursuit of changes. The Liberal Party gives full recognition to this.

Yet, after talking about the history above, the Secretary also understands the Liberal Party’s concern about forcing the eight existing publicly-funded universities―as I have said just now, only three of them are offering self-financing programmes, namely HKU, PolyU and HKBU. With regard to the wishes back then, the Hong Kong Government―or at least the Education Bureau hoped to enact this ordinance, because according to the review conducted in 2018, these publicly-funded universities should also place their fee-charging programmes under another self-financing university to separate it from the university. In other words, the self-financing institutions are regulated under Cap. 320, while the publicly-funded institutions are regulated under Cap. 592, and they should be spun off.

From my previous discussions with the Secretary, I am grateful to the Secretary for confirming at present that when this ordinance is enacted, they will not force the eight universities to separate or spin off them, but they will promote or encourage them to do so by administrative means.

In this regard, I would also like to mention here that the Liberal Party has very strong views over this. Although the eight tertiary institutions are funded by the Government, those enrolled in the self-financing programmes of the eight tertiary institutions are also Hong Kong people, and their parents also have to pay taxes. I have no idea why should they be given so many difficulties? Who would want their diploma to bear only the name of SPEED University or SPACE University instead of Hong Kong SPACE University or PolyU SPEED University? Which student would not like to see the diploma in this way? Why do we have to force them to spin off?

Secondly, over the past 10 years or so, we have also reflected that we do not support the Government for providing subsidies only to students enrolled in such programmes offered by institutions other than the eight tertiary institutions. Throughout the past 20 years, the authorities have thought that they should help some private universities to grow and “secure a firm footing”, so the policies are all about helping them. But then, they have overlooked the fact that this is an exploitation of local students enrolled in self-financing programmes. I find it unfair that the authorities have not provided any financial assistance to them. I hope that today and in the future, the Government will subsidize them in this aspect, and the Liberal Party would also continue to fight for this. This includes not allowing these students to use facilities of the universities, which I also consider as an exploitation of the students. On the one hand, the authorities always hope to help the private universities, but the problem is, this is an exploitation of the students in that they cannot use the existing resources of the eight tertiary institutions. According to my understanding, when self-financing students of the eight tertiary institutions use the resources of the universities nowadays, the universities would calculate the amount of the fees and charge them, so why must the authorities refuse to allow their students to use the resources? I very much hope that the Secretary can really think about how to follow up on these matters in the next step.

Our concern is that such changes at present may involve appropriate changes to be made by the operators, as well as changes in the governance structure and personnel changes arising from the latest registration mechanism. I think this incident has already posed a great challenge to the universities which are already very busy. Therefore, we hope that the Government will fully understand the difficulties faced by the universities, seriously review the directions of the relevant policies, and leave room for manoeuvre in implementing the policies. I urge the Administration to give a response in its speech later on.

Deputy President, I so submit.