HKU POP SITE releases popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang, Secretaries of Departments and Directors of Bureaux under the accountability systemBack

The Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong interviewed 1,008 Hong Kong people between 1 and 3 June by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. The survey finds that the popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang continue to drop over the last two weeks, almost back to the level registered before the first case of swine flu was confirmed in Hong Kong. CE's approval rate now stands at 43%, with a net value of positive 3 percentage points. For the Secretaries of Departments, compared to one month ago, the support ratings of both CS Henry Tang and FS John Tsang have gone down slightly, while that of SJ Wong Yan-lung has dropped significantly. While changes in the approval rates of the three Secretaries of Departments are all within sampling errors, the disapproval rate of CS Henry Tang has notably dropped 3 percentage points. SJ Wong Yan-lung remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department. As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, with the exception of Secretary for Food and Health York Chow, now stands at the second place with a 5 percentage point increase in approval rate to reach the record high since his appointment, the approval rates of most of the Directors have dropped. The Directors of Bureaux whose approval rates have dropped beyond sampling errors include Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng, Secretary for Education Michael Suen and Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Ceajer Chan. Their approval rates have gone down by 7, 5 and 5 percentage points respectively. Moreover, negative popularity has reappeared among Secretaries and Directors, as Secretary for Education Michael Suen and Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Stephen Lam register net popularity of negative 4 and 1 percentage points. According to the benchmarks set by us quite some time ago, Ambrose Lee, now falls under the categories of "'ideal" performance. Wong Yan-lung, York Chow, Matthew Cheung and Carrie Lam can be labeled as "successful", Henry Tang, John Tsang, Donald Tsang, Michael Suen, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as "mediocre", and Eva Cheng, Denise Yue, Edward Yau, Ceajer Chan and Rita Lau can be labeled as "inconspicuous". No official falls under the categories of "depressing" or "disastrous". The sampling error of all approval and disapproval rates is between +/-1 and 4 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling error of rating figures needs another calculation. The response rate of the survey is 65%.

Points to note:
* The address of the "HKU POP SITE" is http://hkupop.pori.hk, journalists can check out the details of the survey there.
* The sample size of this survey is 1,008 successful interviews, not 1,008 x 65.0% response rate. In the past, many media made this mistake.
* The maximum sampling error of all approval and disapproval rates is between +/-1 and 4 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling error of rating figures needs another calculation. "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. When quoting these figures, journalists can state "sampling error of various ratings not more than +/-1.2 and sampling error of percentages not more than +/-4% at 95% confidence level".
* When quoting percentages of this survey, journalists should refrain from reporting decimal places, but when quoting the rating figures, one decimal place can be used, in order to match the precision level of the figures.
* The data of this survey is collected by means of random telephone interviews conducted by real interviewers, not by any interactive voice system (IVS). If a research organization uses "computerized random telephone survey" to camouflage its IVS operation, it should be considered unprofessional.

POP today releases on schedule via the POP Site the latest figures of CE Donald Tsang, Secretaries of Departments and Directors of Bureaux under the accountability system. As a general practice, all figures have been weighted according to provisional figures obtained from the Census and Statistics Department regarding the gender-age distribution of the Hong Kong population in 2008 year-end. Herewith the contact information for the latest survey:

As different questions involve different sub-samples, the sample errors will vary accordingly. The table below briefly shows the relationship between sample size and maximum sampling errors for the readers to capture the corresponding changes:

"Maximum sampling errors" occur when survey figures are close to 50%. If the figures are close to 0% or 100%, the sampling error will diminish accordingly. The sampling errors of ratings, however, will depend on the distribution of the raw figures. Since January 2007, POP lists out the sampling errors of all survey figures in detail and explain them in due course. Recent popularity figures of Donald Tsang are summarized as follows:

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.

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

Our latest survey shows that, the popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang continue to drop over the last two weeks, almost back to the level registered before the first case of swine flu was confirmed in Hong Kong. CE's approval rate now stands at 43%, with a net value of positive 3 percentage points.

For the Secretaries of Departments, compared to one month ago, the support ratings of both CS Henry Tang and FS John Tsang have gone down slightly, while that of SJ Wong Yan-lung has dropped significantly. While changes in the approval rates of the three Secretaries of Departments are all within sampling errors, the disapproval rate of CS Henry Tang has notably dropped 3 percentage points. SJ Wong Yan-lung remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department.

As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, with the exception of Secretary for Food and Health York Chow, now stands at the second place with a 5 percentage point increase in approval rate to reach the record high since his appointment, the approval rates of most of the Directors have dropped. The Directors of Bureaux whose approval rates have dropped beyond sampling errors include Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng, Secretary for Education Michael Suen and Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Ceajer Chan. Their approval rates have gone down by 7, 5 and 5 percentage points respectively.

Moreover, negative popularity has reappeared among Secretaries and Directors, as Secretary for Education Michael Suen and Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Stephen Lam register net popularity of negative 4 and 1 percentage points.

According to the benchmarks set by us quite some time ago, Ambrose Lee, now falls under the categories of "'ideal" performance. Wong Yan-lung, York Chow, Matthew Cheung and Carrie Lam can be labeled as "successful", Henry Tang, John Tsang, Donald Tsang, Michael Suen, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as "mediocre", and Eva Cheng, Denise Yue, Edward Yau, Ceajer Chan and Rita Lau can be labeled as "inconspicuous". No official falls under the categories of "depressing" or "disastrous". As for the reasons affecting the popularity change of these officials, readers can make their own judgment using detailed records shown in our "Opinion Daily" feature page.

The following table summarizes the grading of the principal officials for readers' easy reference:

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