HKU POP releases popularity figures of CE and principal officialsBack

The Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong interviewed 1,008 Hong Kong people between November 4 and 7, 2013 by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. Our survey shows that the popularity of CE CY Leung continues to drop. Having dropped below the warning line of 45 in the last survey, his support rating now drops to another record low of 41.2 marks. Leung’s approval rate now stands at 22%, disapproval rate at 63%, giving a net popularity of negative 41 percentage points, which is historical low since he took office. As for the Secretaries of Departments, the latest support rating of CS Carrie Lam is 60.8 marks, her approval rate 60%, disapproval rate 9%, giving a net popularity of positive 52 percentage points. As for FS John Tsang, his latest support rating is 53.9 marks, approval rate 42%, disapproval rate 17%, and net popularity positive 25 percentage points. As for SJ Rimsky Yuen, his support rating is 49.9 marks, approval rate 26%, disapproval rate 19%, giving a net popularity of positive 8 percentage points. Carrie Lam remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department. As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the net approval rates of 9 among the 12 Directors have gone down, 2 have gone up and 1 remained unchanged. Among them, those registered significant changes in net approval rate include Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Gregory So, Secretary for Education Eddie Ng, Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok, Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing, Secretary for Development Paul Chan, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam, and Secretary for Food and Health Ko Wing-man, down by 24, 15, 7, 7, 7, 6 percentage points and up by 5 percentage points respectively. Among all the Directors, Gregory So, Eddie Ng, and Paul Chan registered negative popularities, at negative 12, 43 and 45 percentage points respectively. Ko Wing-man continues to be the most popular Director, at positive 79 percentage points. According to POP’s standard, Ko Wing-man falls under the category of “ideal” performer, Carrie Lam and Matthew Cheung now fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Lai Tung-kwok, John Tsang, Anthony Cheung, Wong Kam-sing, Tsang Tak-sing and Gregory So can be labeled as “mediocre”, that of Ceajer Chan, Paul Tang, Rimsky Yuen and Raymond Tam can be labeled as “inconspicuous”. CY Leung, Paul Chan and Eddie Ng fall into the category of “depressing” performer, while no one falls into that of “disastrous”. The maximum sampling errors of all approval and disapproval rates is +/-4 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling errors of rating figures and net approval rates need another calculation. The response rate of the survey is 67%.

[6] Errors are calculated at 95% confidence level using full sample size. “95% confidence level” means 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. Questions using only sub-samples would have bigger sampling error. Sampling errors of ratings and net approval rates are calculated according to the distribution of the scores collected.

[7] Based on 95% confidence interval.

[8] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level” means 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. Media can state “sampling error of rating not more than +/-1.7, sampling error of percentages not more than +/-3%, sampling error of net approval rates not more than +/-5% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site.
[9] Such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level, meaning that they are statistically significant prima facie. However, whether numerical differences are statistically significant or not is not the same as whether they are practically useful or meaningful.

[10] The frequency of this series of questions is different from that of CE popularity ratings. Comparisons, if made, should be synchronized using the same intervals. Starting from 2011, these questions only uses sub-samples of the tracking surveys concerned, the sample size for each question also varies.
[11] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level” means 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. Media can state “sampling error of various ratings not more than +/-1.9, sampling error of percentages not more than +/-4%, sampling error of net approval rates not more than +/-6% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site.
[12] Such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level, meaning that they are statistically significant prima facie. However, whether numerical differences are statistically significant or not is not the same as whether they are practically useful or meaningful.

Latest popularity figures of Directors of Bureaux under the accountability system are summarized below, in descending order of net approval rates:

[13] Starting from 2006, these questions only uses sub-samples of the tracking surveys concerned, the sample size for each question also varies.
[14] All error figures in the table are calculated at 95% confidence level. “95% confidence level” means 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. Media can state “sampling error of percentages not more than +/-4% and sampling error of net approval rates not more than +/-6% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures. The error margin of previous survey can be found at the POP Site.
[15] Such changes have gone beyond the sampling errors at the 95% confidence level, meaning that they are statistically significant prima facie. However, whether numerical differences are statistically significant or not is not the same as whether they are practically useful or meaningful.
[16] In one decimal place, the respective net approval rates of Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam and Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Gregory So are 12.5 and 12.4 percentage points. Thus, they are ranked seventh and eighth respectively.
[17] In one decimal place, the respective net approval rates of Secretary for Transport and Housing Anthony Cheung and Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok are 22.1 and 21.9 percentage points. Thus, they are ranked fourth and fifth respectively.

The latest survey showed that, CE CY Leung scored 41.2 marks, and 22% supported him as CE, his net approval rate is negative 41 percentage points. Meanwhile, the corresponding ratings of CS Carrie Lam, FS John Tsang and SJ Rimsky Yuen were 60.8, 53.9 and 49.9 marks, and 60%, 42% and 26% would vote for their reappointment correspondingly. Their net approval rates are positive 52, 25 and 8 percentage points respectively.

As for the Directors of Bureaux, according to the net approval rates, results revealed that the top position goes to Secretary for Food and Health Ko Wing-man, attaining positive 79 percentage points. The 2nd and 3rd places belong to Secretary for Labour and Welfare Matthew Cheung and Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Ceajer Chan with net approval rates positive 35 and positive 30 percentage points respectively. Secretary for Transport and Housing Anthony Cheung, Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok, Secretary for the Civil Service Paul Tang, Secretary for the Environment Wong Kam-sing, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam, Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing, Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Gregory So, Secretary for Education Eddie Ng and Secretary for Development Paul Chan ranked 4th to 12th, their corresponding net approval rates are positive 22, positive 22, positive 17, positive 8, positive 6, 0, negative 12, negative 43 and negative 45 percentage points. In other words, only Ko Wing-man scored net approval rate of over 50% among all Directors of Bureaux.

In January 2007, POP opened a feature page called “Opinion Daily” at the “POP Site”, to record significant events and selected polling figures on a day-to-day basis, in order to let readers judge by themselves the reasons for the ups and downs of different opinion figures. In July 2007, POP collaborated with Wisers Information Limited whereby Wisers supplies to POP each day starting from July 24, a record of significant events of that day, according to the research method designed by POP. These daily entries would be uploaded to “Opinion Daily” as soon as they are verified by POP.

For the polling items covered in this press release, the previous survey of some items was conducted from 3 to 8 October, 2013 while this survey was conducted from 4 to 7 November, 2013. During this period, herewith the significant events selected from counting newspaper headlines and commentaries on a daily basis and covered by at least 25% of the local newspaper articles. Readers can make their own judgment if these significant events have any impacts to different polling figures.

Note: The following commentary was written by Director of POP, Robert Chung.

Our latest survey conducted in early November shows that the popularity of CE CY Leung continues to drop. Having dropped below the warning line of 45 in the last survey, his support rating now drops to another record low of 41.2 marks. Leung’s approval rate now stands at 22%, disapproval rate at 63%, giving a net popularity of negative 41 percentage points, which is historical low since he took office.

As for the Secretaries of Departments, the latest support rating of CS Carrie Lam is 60.8 marks, her approval rate 60%, disapproval rate 9%, giving a net popularity of positive 52 percentage points. As for FS John Tsang, his latest support rating is 53.9 marks, approval rate 42%, disapproval rate 17%, and net popularity positive 25 percentage points. As for SJ Rimsky Yuen, his support rating is 49.9 marks, approval rate 26%, disapproval rate 19%, giving a net popularity of positive 8 percentage points. Carrie Lam remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department.

As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the net approval rates of 9 among the 12 Directors have gone down, 2 have gone up and 1 remained unchanged. Among them, those registered significant changes in net approval rate include Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Gregory So, Secretary for Education Eddie Ng, Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok, Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing, Secretary for Development Paul Chan, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam, and Secretary for Food and Health Ko Wing-man, down by 24, 15, 7, 7, 7, 6 percentage points and up by 5 percentage points respectively. Among all the Directors, Gregory So, Eddie Ng, and Paul Chan registered negative popularities, at negative 12, 43 and 45 percentage points respectively. Ko Wing-man continues to be the most popular Director, at positive 79 percentage points.

According to POP’s standard, Ko Wing-man falls under the category of “ideal” performer, Carrie Lam and Matthew Cheung now fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Lai Tung-kwok, John Tsang, Anthony Cheung, Wong Kam-sing, Tsang Tak-sing and Gregory So can be labeled as “mediocre”, that of Ceajer Chan, Paul Tang, Rimsky Yuen and Raymond Tam can be labeled as “inconspicuous”. CY Leung, Paul Chan and Eddie Ng fall into the category of “depressing” performer, while no one falls into that of “disastrous”.

[18] In one decimal place, the respective approval rates of Secretary for Security Lai Tung-kwok and FS John Tsang Chun-wah are 42.3% and 41.9%.

• November 19, 2013 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: People's most familiar political figures