HKU POP SITE releases popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang, Secretaries of Departments and Directors of Bureaux under the accountability systemBack
| Press Release on September 7, 2010 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Abstract | Latest Figures | Opinion Daily | Commentary | Future Release (Tentative) | |
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Abstract
The Public Opinion Prgramme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong interviewed 1,010 Hong Kong people between August 31 and September 3 by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. Our latest survey shows that after the Manila hostage incident, the popularity of the CE and most principal officials have gone up. Compared to two weeks ago, the support rating of CE Donald Tsang has surged by 7.2 marks to reach 58.5, a record high in more than two years. His approval rate has also surged by 12 percentage points, switching his net popularity from negative to positive for the first time in 6 months. CE's net popularity now stands at positive 10 percentage points. For the Secretaries of Departments, compared to one month ago, the popularity of CS Henry Tang, FS John Tsang and SJ Wong Yan-lung have all gone up. Among them, Henry Tang's rating is at record high in two years, as his approval rate surged 13 percentage points to reach an over 50% level. The net approval rates of the three Secretaries of Departments are Henry Tang positive 43, John Tsang positive 36 and Wong Yan-lung positive 56 percentage points respectively. Wong Yan-lung remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department. As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the approval rates of 8 among 12 Directors have gone up, 2 have gone down and 2 remained unchanged. Among them, Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Rita Lau, Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee and Secretary for Labour and Welfare Matthew Cheung have changed beyond sampling error, up by 7, 5 and 5 percentage points respectively. No Secretary or Director registers negative popularity, meaning that one's disapproval rate is higher than the approval rate. According to POP's standard, Ambrose Lee falls under the category of "ideal" performance. Wong Yan-lung, Henry Tang, Matthew Cheung, York Chow, John Tsang and Carrie Lam now fall under the category of "successful". Donald Tsang, Eva Cheng, Edward Yau, Michael Suen, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as "mediocre". Denise Yue, Ceajer Chan and Rita Lau can be labeled as "inconspicuous". No official falls under the category of "depressing" or "disastrous". Government officials should make use of this opportunity to get close to the people to help them solve their problems, even when the crisis is over. The maximum sampling error of all approval and disapproval rates is between +/-2 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: [1] The address of the "HKU POP SITE" is http://hkupop.pori.hk, journalists can check out the details of the survey there. [2] The sample size of this survey is 1,010 successful interviews, not 1,010 x 65.2% response rate. In the past, many media made this mistake. [3] The maximum sampling error of all approval and disapproval rates is between +/-2 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". [4] 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. [5] 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. |
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Latest Figures
POP today releases on schedule via POP SITE the latest popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang, Secretaries of Departments and Directors of Bureaux under the accountability system. All the 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 mid-2010. 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 CE Donald Tsang are summarized as follows:
[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. Figures on the latest popularity ratings of the three Secretaries of Departments under the accountability system are summarized below:
[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 +/-1.1, sampling error of percentages not more than +/-3% 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. Figures on the latest popularity ratings of Directors of Bureaux under the accountability system are summarized below:
[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% 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 approval rate of Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing is 32.5%, while that of Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Stephen Lam is 31.7%. The latest survey showed that, CE Donald Tsang scored 58.5 marks, and 47% supported him as the Chief Executive. Meanwhile, the corresponding ratings of CS Henry Tang, FS John Tsang and SJ Wong Yan-lung were 58.5, 57.6 and 60.7 marks and 54%, 52% and 63% would vote for their reappointment correspondingly. As for the Directors of Bureaux, results revealed that the top approval rate fell to Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee, attaining 71%. The 2nd to 4th places belonged to Secretary for Labour and Welfare Matthew Cheung, Secretary for Food and Health York Chow and Secretary for Development Carrie Lam, with approval rate 54%, 52% and 51% respectively. Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng, Secretary for the Environment Edward Yau, Secretary for the Civil Service Denise Yue, Secretary for Education Michael Suen, Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Ceajer Chan, Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Rita Lau, Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing and Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Stephen Lam ranked 5th to 12th, as they gained 44%, 37%, 36%, 35%, 34%, 33%, 32% and 32% support from the public respectively. In other words, only Ambrose Lee, Matthew Cheung, York Chow and Carrie Lam scored approval rate of over 50% among all Directors of Bureaux. |
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Opinion Daily
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 August 2 to 6, 2010 while this survey was conducted from August 31 to September 3, 2010. 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.
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Commentary
Note: The following commentary was written by Director of POP Robert Chung.
Our latest survey shows that after the Manila hostage incident, the popularity of the CE and most principal officials have gone up. Compared to two weeks ago, the support rating of CE Donald Tsang has surged by 7.2 marks to reach 58.5, a record high in more than two years. His approval rate has also surged by 12 percentage points, switching his net popularity from negative to positive for the first time in 6 months. CE's net popularity now stands at positive 10 percentage points. For the Secretaries of Departments, compared to one month ago, the popularity of CS Henry Tang, FS John Tsang and SJ Wong Yan-lung have all gone up. Among them, Henry Tang's rating is at record high in two years, as his approval rate surged 13 percentage points to reach an over 50% level. The net approval rates of the three Secretaries of Departments are Henry Tang positive 43, John Tsang positive 36 and Wong Yan-lung positive 56 percentage points respectively. Wong Yan-lung remains to be the most popular Secretary of Department. As for the Directors of Bureaux, compared to one month ago, the approval rates of 8 among 12 Directors have gone up, 2 have gone down and 2 remained unchanged. Among them, Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Rita Lau, Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee and Secretary for Labour and Welfare Matthew Cheung have changed beyond sampling error, up by 7, 5 and 5 percentage points respectively. No Secretary or Director registers negative popularity, meaning that one's disapproval rate is higher than the approval rate. According to POP's standard, Ambrose Lee falls under the category of "ideal" performance. Wong Yan-lung, Henry Tang, Matthew Cheung, York Chow, John Tsang and Carrie Lam now fall under the category of "successful". Donald Tsang, Eva Cheng, Edward Yau, Michael Suen, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as "mediocre". Denise Yue, Ceajer Chan and Rita Lau can be labeled as "inconspicuous". No official falls under the category of "depressing" or "disastrous". Government officials should make use of this opportunity to get close to the people to help them solve their problems, even when the crisis is over. The following table summarizes the grading of the principal officials for readers' easy reference:
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Future Release (Tentative)
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| Abstract | Latest Figures | Opinion Daily | Commentary | Future Release (Tentative) | |
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