Xu Zhengyu: Increase Hong Kong's financial coordination, control spending effectively, and allocate department resources efficiently.

After deducting the net income from the Hong Kong government's statistics and issuance of government bonds, it is expected that the deficit for this fiscal year will be less than 100 billion Hong Kong dollars. Vincent Xu, the Secretary for Finance and Treasury of Hong Kong, stated in the Legislative Council meeting that the Hong Kong government is actively studying ways to increase fiscal consolidation efforts to control expenditure growth, including requiring government departments to re-examine resource allocation and work priorities, and to respond by reallocating resources. Regarding the reduction of expenditure in different policy categories, Xu stated that the Hong Kong government will not make across-the-board cuts, but will consider overall arrangements, and in this fiscal year, each policy bureau and department has reduced 1% of their recurrent expenditure. In addition, the income from government bond issuance will be used for infrastructure projects, and relevant departments have been asked to review engineering expenditure in the coming years to meet societal needs and policy bureau requirements. At the same time, Xu stated that the Hong Kong government has been strictly controlling the civil service establishment, and it is expected that by the end of March 2025, the civil service establishment will be reduced to 194,000 positions. Departments will improve efficiency through optimizing work priorities, reallocating internal resources, streamlining processes, and applying technology. In response to concerns from legislators about how the government will address the fiscal deficit in the short, medium, and long term, Xu mentioned that the Hong Kong government has been aware of the need to increase fiscal consolidation efforts for several years now, and the 2024 budget also includes measures to increase revenue and reduce expenditure. The Hong Kong government has been continuously reviewing the fiscal situation and introducing different measures to address it.