HKU POP releases popularity figures of CE and principal officialsBack

(1) POP will conduct instant survey on CE’s policy address - As in previous years, Public Opinion Programme (POP) at The University of Hong Kong will conduct an instant survey after the Chief Executive delivers his policy address tomorrow (January 14, 2015). Results will be announced as soon as possible, after which POP will conduct follow-up surveys. Media interested in sponsoring these surveys can contact POP.

(2) To facilitate academic study and rational discussion, POP has already released for public examination some time ago via the “HKU POP Site” (http://hkupop.pori.hk) the raw data of all 62 regular rating surveys of CE CY Leung, as well as the 181 regular rating surveys of former CE Donald Tsang and 239 regular rating surveys of former CE CH Tung, along with related demographics of respondents. POP today releases the raw data of the latest which is the 63rd CE rating survey of CY Leung. Please follow normal academic standards when using or citing such data.

POP interviewed 1,021 Hong Kong people between 2 and 8 January, 2015 by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. Our survey shows that the popularity figures of CE CY Leung continue to fluctuate since two months ago. His latest support rating stands at 40.6 marks, significantly dropped from two weeks ago. His approval rate now stands at 23%, disapproval rate 62%, giving a net popularity of negative 39 percentage points, which is also a significant drop. As for the Secretaries of Departments, the latest support rating of CS Carrie Lam is 54.8 marks, her approval rate 47%, disapproval rate 20%, giving a net popularity of positive 27 percentage points. The latest support rating of FS John Tsang is 56.1 marks, approval rate 54%, disapproval rate 13%, and net popularity positive 41 percentage points. As for SJ Rimsky Yuen, his support rating is 45.8 marks, approval rate 32%, disapproval rate 30%, giving a net popularity of positive 2 percentage points. John Tsang continues to be the most popular Secretary of Department. As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the net approval rates of 7 among the 12 Directors have gone down, while 5 have gone up. Among them, only Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing registered a significant change in net approval rate, down by 7 percentage points. Among all the Directors, only Tsang Tak Sing, Eddie Ng and Paul Chan registered negative popularities, at negative 2, 33 and 38 percentage points respectively. Ko Wing-man continues to be the most popular Director, with net approval rate at positive 72 percentage points. According to POP’s standard, Ko Wing-man falls under the category of “ideal” performer, John Tsang and Matthew Cheung fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Carrie Lam, Anthony Cheung, Ceajer Chan, Lai Tung-kwok, Raymond Tam, Wong Kam-sing, Rimsky Yuen, Gregory So and Tsang Tak-sing can be labeled as “mediocre”. That of Paul Tang 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 66%. As the support rating of CE CY Leung continues to stand below the warning line of 45 again, Director of POP, Robert Chung, again reprints the abstracts of two articles written by him before on CE popularity, to discuss the possibility of a governance crisis. The articles can be downloaded in full from the POP Site.

[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 +/-1.8, 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 under the same weighting method, 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 +/-2.3, 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 under the same weighting method, 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 +/-7% 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 under the same weighting method, 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.

The latest survey showed that, CE CY Leung scored 40.6 marks, and 23% supported him as CE, his net approval rate is negative 39 percentage points. Meanwhile, the corresponding ratings of CS Carrie Lam, FS John Tsang and SJ Rimsky Yuen were 54.8, 56.1 and 45.8 marks, and 47%, 54% and 32% would vote for their reappointment correspondingly. Their net approval rates are positive 27, positive 41 and positive 2 percentage points respectively.

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 8 to 11 December, 2014 while this survey was conducted from 2 to 8 January, 2015. 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 January shows that the popularity figures of CE CY Leung continue to fluctuate since two months ago. His latest support rating stands at 40.6 marks, significantly dropped from two weeks ago. His approval rate now stands at 23%, disapproval rate 62%, giving a net popularity of negative 39 percentage points, which is also a significant drop.

As for the Secretaries of Departments, the latest support rating of CS Carrie Lam is 54.8 marks, her approval rate 47%, disapproval rate 20%, giving a net popularity of positive 27 percentage points. The latest support rating of FS John Tsang is 56.1 marks, approval rate 54%, disapproval rate 13%, and net popularity positive 41 percentage points. As for SJ Rimsky Yuen, his support rating is 45.8 marks, approval rate 32%, disapproval rate 30%, giving a net popularity of positive 2 percentage points. John Tsang continues to be the most popular Secretary of Department.

As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the net approval rates of 7 among the 12 Directors have gone down, while 5 have gone up. Among them, only Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing registered a significant change in net approval rate, down by 7 percentage points. Among all the Directors, only Tsang Tak Sing, Eddie Ng and Paul Chan registered negative popularities, at negative 2, 33 and 38 percentage points respectively. Ko Wing-man continues to be the most popular Director, with net approval rate at positive 72 percentage points.

According to POP’s standard, Ko Wing-man falls under the category of “ideal” performer, John Tsang and Matthew Cheung fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Carrie Lam, Anthony Cheung, Ceajer Chan, Lai Tung-kwok, Raymond Tam, Wong Kam-sing, Rimsky Yuen, Gregory So and Tsang Tak-sing can be labeled as “mediocre”. That of Paul Tang 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”.

• January 15, 2015 (Thursday) 1pm to 2pm: Policy Address Instant Poll

• January 20, 2015 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: Policy Address First Follow-up Survey