HKU POP SITE releases the latest rating of CE Tung Chee-hwa, people's satisfaction with CE's policy direction, their appraisal of the performance of the HKSAR Government and members of the Legislative Council in generalBack

The Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong today releases on schedule via the "HKU POP SITE" (http://hkupop.pori.hk) the latest rating of CE Tung Chee-hwa, people's satisfaction with CE's policy direction, their appraisal of the performance of the HKSAR Government and members of the Legislative Council in general. POP's normal practice is to release the results of our regular surveys every Tuesday at 2 pm via our POP Site, except during public holidays, each time with a forecast of the items to be released in the forthcoming week. We will review and adjust this operation regularly. According to this schedule, the date and time of our next release will be June 3, 2003, Tuesday, at 2 pm, the latest findings of our annual survey on the June Fourth Incident will be released.

Between May 15 and 20, 2003, POP conducted a random telephone survey which successfully interviewed 1,067 Cantonese speakers in Hong Kong of age 18 or above. Results showed that the latest rating of CE Tung Chee-hwa was 44.2 marks, representing a significant increase of 3.0 marks from that of early May. Besides, 13% of the respondents were satisfied with Tung's policy direction, while 50% were dissatisfied. When compared to the results of mid-April, the satisfaction figure has significantly increased by 5 percentage points, whereas a significant drop of 8 percentage points was recorded for the dissatisfaction figure.

Regarding people's satisfaction with the HKSAR Government, the latest results revealed that 18% of the respondents were satisfied with its performance, 53% were dissatisfied, while 26% said "half-half". The satisfaction figure has significantly risen by 7 percentage points from that of mid-April, whereas a significant drop of 8 percentage points was observed for the dissatisfaction figure.

Besides, with respect to people's appraisal of the performance of members of the Legislative Council in general, the latest figures indicated that 13% of the respondents were satisfied, 43% were not, 27% said "half-half", while 17% did not give a definite answer. The dissatisfaction figure has increased for 5 consecutive times since July last year, with an accumulated increment of 23 percentage points. When compared to the results obtained in mid-March, the dissatisfaction figure has significantly increased by 7 percentage points, setting another record high since the First SAR Legislative Council was formed in July 1998. On the other hand, the satisfaction figure has significantly decreased by 5 percentage points from that of mid-March.

Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, made the following analysis: "As the SARS epidemic gradually subsides, people's rating of CE Tung Chee-hwa, their satisfaction with his policy direction, and their appraisal of the performance of the SAR Government in general have all rebounded. On the contrary, people's satisfaction with the performance of the LegCo members in general has dropped significantly. The latest rating of Tung was 44.2 marks, which has almost gone back to that of mid-February, although still narrowly within the danger zone. Meanwhile, the other satisfaction indicators have by and large gone back to the level registered in late January. In other words, the impact on the government's credibility caused by the SARS outbreak has somewhat come to an end for the time being. However, this upward trend was balanced by a decline in people's satisfaction with the performance of the LegCo members in general. The figure has hit a record low, indicating inconsistent demands between the general public and the legislators amidst the subsiding epidemic."

The new poll released in the POP Site today is a random telephone survey conducted by interviewers, targeting at Cantonese speakers in Hong Kong of age 18 or above. The sample size of the survey is 1,067 respondents. At 95% confidence level, the sampling error of the rating of CE Tung Chee-hwa is plus/minus 1.4 marks, while that of all percentages is less than plus/minus 3 percentage points. The meaning of "95% confidence level" is that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified. Shall anyone have any question regarding the research design of the surveys published in the POP Site, members of the POP Team will be happy to answer them, but we will not further comment on the findings. Shall any person or journalist have any other questions, please email them to us at <[email protected]>. The Director of Public Opinion Programme would answer them as soon as possible. We will keep such an arrangement under constant review, suggestions most welcome. Please note that everything carried in the POP Site does not represent the stand of the University of Hong Kong. Dr Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, is responsible for everything posted herewith, except for column articles which represent the stand of their authors.