HKU POP releases popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang,CE-elect CY Leung and principal officialsBack

Starting from today, the Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong would release the popularity figures of CE and CE-elect Leung Chun-ying together, until the incumbent CE retires. This arrangement was first practiced in December 1996 when CH Tung became CE-elect, because both the incumbent CE and the CE-elect need to be monitored by public opinion. Readers may refer to the “Popularity of Tung Chee-Hwa” feature page under “Archive – POP Polls” in our POP Site (http://hkupop.pori.hk).

As for the survey questions, all popularity figures of the incumbent CE and the CE-elect come from our long-existing “0-100 support rating” question, and our “approval/disapproval rate” question, namely, “If a general election of the Chief Executive were to be held tomorrow, and you had the right to vote, would you vote for XXX?”. The former has been used since 1991 while the latter was introduced in 2002, and they have been used continually ever since. POP followed exactly the same method when we last released the popularity figures of CE-elect CY Leung. On the pros and cons of these two methods of measurement, please refer to the article “New Perspectives on Chief Executive Ratings” under “POP Column” in our POP Site. The article was published on 12 June 2003.

POP interviewed 1,006 Hong Kong people between April 2 to 10, 2012 by means of a random telephone survey conducted by real interviewers. The survey shows that the support rating of CE Donald Tsang is 44.6 marks, slightly lower than last time. His approval rate now stands at 23%, disapproval rate at 70%, giving a net popularity of negative 47 percentage points. Tsang’s overall popularity has not changed much compared with two weeks ago. As for CE-elect CY Leung, his latest support rating of is 52.2 marks, approval rate 46%, disapproval rate 45%, meaning that his net popularity has changed significantly from negative 13 to positive 1 percentage point, widening his lead over CE Donald Tsang. As for the Secretaries of Departments, compared to a month ago, the rating of CS Stephen Lam has dropped significantly. His latest support rating is 36.7 marks, approval rate 14%, disapproval rate 45% which is his all-time record high, giving a net popularity of negative 31 percentage points. The popularity of FS John Tsang has dropped somewhat, his support rating is 49.8 marks which is a new low in 7 months. The net approval rate of John Tsang now stands at positive 10 percentage points. As for SJ Wong Yan-lung, his support rating is 60.3 marks, approval rate 63%, disapproval rate 6%, and his net popularity stands at positive 57 percentage points. 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 rate of 5 of the 12 Directors have gone up, that of 7 Directors have gone down. Among them, only Secretary for Development Carrie Lam has registered change in approval rates beyond sampling error, up by 7 percentage points to reach her all-time record high. Carrie Lam continues to be the most popular Director. Among all the Directors, only Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing and Secretary for Education Michael Suen register negative popularity, at negative 10 and 34 percentage points respectively. According to POP’s standard, Carrie Lam falls under the category of “ideal” performer, Wong Yan-lung, Ambrose Lee and Matthew Cheung now fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Eva Cheng, York Chow, Edward Yau, Ceajer Chan, John Tsang, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as “mediocre”, that of Denise Yue, Raymond Tam and Gregory So can be labeled as “inconspicuous”, Michael Suen can be labeled as “depressing” and that of Donald Tsang “disastrous”. The maximum sampling error of all approval and disapproval rates is +/-4 percentage points at 95% confidence level, while the sampling error of rating figures needs another calculation. The response rate of the survey is 60%.

POP today releases on schedule via POP SITE the latest popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang, CE-elect Leung Chun-ying, as well as 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

As different questions involve different sub-samples, the sampling 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:

Recent popularity figures of CE Donald Tsang are summarized as follows:

[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 +/-1.3, 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.
[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.

Recent popularity figures of CE-elect CY Leung are summarized as follows:

^[10] 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 +/-1.5, sampling error of percentages not more than +/-3% at 95% confidence level” when quoting the above figures.
[11] 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.

Recent popularity figures of the three Secretaries of Departments under the accountability system are summarized below:

[12] The frequency of this series of questions is different for different questions, and also 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.
[13] 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 +/-2.0, 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.
[14] 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:

The latest survey showed that, CE Donald Tsang scored 44.6 marks, and 23% supported him as the Chief Executive, his net approval rate is negative 47%. CE-elect Leung Chun-ying scored 52.2 marks, and 46% supported him as CE, his net approval rate is positive 1%. Meanwhile, the corresponding ratings of CS Stephen Lam, FS John Tsang and SJ Wong Yan-lung were 36.7, 49.8 and 60.3 marks, and 14%, 36% and 63% would vote for their reappointment correspondingly. Their net approval rates are negative 31%, positive 10% and positive 57% respectively.

As for the Directors of Bureaux, results revealed that the top approval rate fell to Secretary for Development Carrie Lam, attaining 74%. Her net approval rate is positive 64%. The 2nd to 5th places belonged to Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee, Secretary for Labour and Welfare Matthew Cheung, Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng and Secretary for Food and Health York Chow, with approval rates 59%, 54%, 49% and 47% respectively and their net approval rates are positive 45%, 41%, 29% and 19% respectively. Secretary for the Environment Edward Yau, Secretary for the Civil Service Denise Yue, Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury Ceajer Chan, Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Raymond Tam, Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing, Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development Gregory So and Secretary for Education Michael Suen ranked 6th to 12th, as they gained 39%, 38%, 38%, 31%, 26%, 23% and 20% support from the public respectively. Their corresponding net approval rates are positive 16%, positive 28%, positive 25%, positive 18%, negative 10%, positive 8% and negative 34%. In other words, Carrie Lam, Ambrose Lee and Matthew Cheung scored 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 March 2 to 7, 2012 while this survey was conducted from April 2 to 10, 2012. 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 shows that the support rating of CE Donald Tsang is 44.6 marks, slightly lower than last time. His approval rate now stands at 23%, disapproval rate at 70%, giving a net popularity of negative 47 percentage points. Tsang’s overall popularity has not changed much compared with two weeks ago.

As for CE-elect CY Leung, his latest support rating of is 52.2 marks, approval rate 46%, disapproval rate 45%, meaning that his net popularity has changed significantly from negative 13 to positive 1 percentage point, widening his lead over CE Donald Tsang.

As for the Secretaries of Departments, compared to a month ago, the rating of CS Stephen Lam has dropped significantly. His latest support rating is 36.7 marks, approval rate 14%, disapproval rate 45% which is his all-time record high, giving a net popularity of negative 31 percentage points. The popularity of FS John Tsang has dropped somewhat, his support rating is 49.8 marks which is a new low in 7 months. The net approval rate of John Tsang now stands at positive 10 percentage points. As for SJ Wong Yan-lung, his support rating is 60.3 marks, approval rate 63%, disapproval rate 6%, and his net popularity stands at positive 57 percentage points. 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 rate of 5 of the 12 Directors have gone up, that of 7 Directors have gone down. Among them, only Secretary for Development Carrie Lam has registered change in approval rates beyond sampling error, up by 7 percentage points to reach her all-time record high. Carrie Lam continues to be the most popular Director. Among all the Directors, only Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing and Secretary for Education Michael Suen register negative popularity, at negative 10 and 34 percentage points respectively.

According to POP’s standard, Carrie Lam falls under the category of “ideal” performer, Wong Yan-lung, Ambrose Lee and Matthew Cheung now fall under the category of “successful” performer. The performance of Eva Cheng, York Chow, Edward Yau, Ceajer Chan, John Tsang, Tsang Tak-sing and Stephen Lam can be labeled as “mediocre”, that of Denise Yue, Raymond Tam and Gregory So can be labeled as “inconspicuous”, Michael Suen can be labeled as “depressing” and that of Donald Tsang “disastrous”.

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

• April 24, 2012 (Tuesday) 1pm to 2pm: Media Performance