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Press Release on November 18, 2003

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 popularity ratings of the top ten Legislative Councillors and people's appraisal of press freedom and media performance. A column article entitled "Explaining the Operation of District Council Election Exit Poll" is also released in the POP Site, discussing the points to note for the operation of exit polls. Ratings of the top 10 Legislative Councillors obtained since February this year are summarized as follows:

Date of survey	4-7/2	2-7/5	11-12/8	10-12/11	Latest change
Sample base	1,020	1,008	1,010	1,062	--
Overall response rate	67.5%	66.2%	68.7%	63.4%	--
Sampling error of ratings (at 95% confidence level)* @	+/- 1.4	+/- 1.4	+/- 1.6	+/- 1.4	--

Audrey Eu	**	**	65.2 [1]	58.1 [1]	-7.1
Rita Fan	58.4 [2]	59.6 [1]	64.5 [2]	56.2 [2]	-8.3
Selina Chow	57.6 [3]	56.8 [3]	60.4 [4]	53.9 [3]	-6.5
Lau Chin-shek	**	56.9 [2]	**	53.6 [4]	--
James Tien	53.4 [8]	51.9 [7]	61.0 [3]	53.0 [5]	-8.0
Lee Cheuk-yan	56.7 [4]	54.5 [4]	57.2 [5]	51.5 [6]	-5.7
Szeto Wah	54.5 [6]	52.4 [6]	54.1 [7]	48.1 [7]	-6.0
Martin Lee	53.9 [7]	50.9 [8]	55.4 [6]	46.3 [8]	-9.1
Emily Lau	54.7 [5]	48.9 [9]	51.7 [9]	45.1 [9]	-6.6
Jasper Tsang	51.7 [10]	47.7 [10]	43.2 [10]	39.6 [10]	-3.6
Andrew Wong	52.2 [9]	53.8 [5]	53.6 [8]	**	--
Chan Yuen-han	60.5 [1]	**	**	**	--

* "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.
** Ratings with recognition rates not reaching top 10 in either stage of survey are not available.
[ ] Number in square brackets indicates rankings.
@ Erratum: The label of error margins in the original release was mis-typed.

With respect to the latest popularity ranking of the Legislative Councillors, the results of mid-November showed that Audrey Eu remained to be the most popularly supported councillor, attaining 58.1 marks. Rita Fan came second with 56.2 marks. Selina Chow, Lau Chin-shek, James Tien and Lee Cheuk-yan ranked 3rd to 6th, with respective support ratings of 53.9, 53.6, 53.0 and 51.5 marks. The 7th to 10th ranks fell to Szeto Wah, Martin Lee, Emily Lau and Jasper Tsang correspondingly. The mean score obtained by the top 5 councillors was 55.0 marks, while that for the top 10 was 50.5 marks, indicating significant drops of 6.7 and 6.1 marks respectively from those of a similar survey conducted in mid-August.

The research design of our "Top 10 Legislative Councillors" has been explained in detail under "Survey Method" in our corresponding web page. The top councillors listed in our latest survey were all those who obtained the highest unprompted mentions in our first stage naming survey conducted in late October (October 19-22). In that survey, respondents could name, unaided, up to 10 legislators whom they knew best. Martin Lee, Emily Lau, Jasper Tsang, Selina Chow and Szeto Wah were mentioned most frequently. Please refer to the relevant table for the rest of the list. Those 12 who were named most frequently then entered into the second stage rating survey. During the second stage rating survey conducted in mid-November, respondents were asked to rate each legislator in turn using a 0-100 scale. 0 indicates absolutely no support, 100 indicates absolute support, and 50 means half-half. After calculation, the bottom 2 legislators in terms of recognition rate were dropped, leaving behind the top 10. For easy reference, the POP Site has already displayed the results of all naming surveys conducted since the year 1998.

Besides, people's satisfaction with the freedom of the press in Hong Kong and their appraisal of the credibility of the local news media in general were also gauged in this survey. Relevant findings obtained since February this year are summarized as follows:

Date of survey	14-18/2	15-20/5	11-12/8	10-12/11	Latest change
Sample base	1,045	1,067	1,010	1,062	--
Overall response rate	68.3%	65.1%	68.7%	63.4%	--
Sampling error of percentages(at 95% confidence level)*	+/- 3%	+/- 3%	+/- 3%	+/- 3%	--
Sampling error of ratings (at 95% confidence level)*	+/- 0.12	+/- 0.10	+/- 0.10	+/- 0.10	--

Freedom of the press in HK: Satisfaction rate**	65%	74%	66%	55%	-11%
Freedom of the press in HK: Dissatisfaction rate**	14%	10%	11%	12%	+1%
Credibility of the local news media in general	5.68	6.10	6.10	5.65	-0.45

Results showed that, 55% of the respondents were satisfied with the freedom of the press in Hong Kong, representing a significant drop of 11 percentage points from that of mid-August. As for the credibility rating of the Hong Kong news media in general, on a scale of 0-10, the latest figure registered was 5.65 marks.

Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, was puzzled by the across-the-board drop in all figures. "Recent events surrounding Harbour Fest, Michael Wong, university budget cuts, and even District Council Elections, may have affected people's sentiment, subject to further observation," he said.

Meanwhile, in his article on exit poll, Chung criticized some candidates for conducting exit polls without telling respondents their true motives - that of using interview results for immediate electoral engineering purpose. Such activities were usually camouflaged under the name of school projects, in order to cheat respondents. Chung suggested all political and research parties to conduct exit polls openly, use scientific sampling method, and if possible, share their resources and data for the benefit of the entire community.

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 November 25, 2003, Tuesday, at 2 pm, the latest figures on the popularity of CE Tung Chee-hwa and people's appraisal of the performance of the HKSAR Government will be released.

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 <pop.network@hkupop.pori.hk>. 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.