Q1 Relief measures of the Government

MR CHAN CHUN-YING (in Cantonese):

Secretary HUI, let me first declare that I have not personally taken part in any discussions between the banking sector and the Government concerning the disbursement arrangements for the cash handout. With regard to the suggestion put forward by Mr Paul TSE in the main question, I understand that one additional procedure will be needed for processing the documents received if eligible citizens are made to sign another authorization form before the sum of $10,000 can be disbursed to them. Such being the case, will consideration be given by the Secretary to allowing banks to disburse the sum immediately after receiving applications from individual clients and obtaining verification from the Government of their eligibility for receiving the money, so that there will be no need for banks to wait for allocation of funds from the Government? I believe the time gap thus arisen should not be too long, and the costs involved should also not be too high. Will the Secretary explore with the banking sector the possibility of adopting this measure to slightly expedite the entire process?

SECRETARY FOR FINANCIAL SERVICES AND THE TREASURY (in Cantonese):

President, the supplementary questions raised just now by several Members are all related to the registration procedure. Actually, by conducting registration of eligible citizens under the Scheme launched this time, we would like to obtain citizens’ consent for authorizing the Government to use the data so collected for making the required arrangements in the future should a similar scheme be launched then, so that they need not complete the registration procedure again. Hence, we will retain the personal data collected for the Scheme launched this time.