Changing the rules of procedure is insufficient to stop filibusters

The fifth-term Legislative Council of the Hong Kong SAR ended its term in office at midnight on July 15, with the opposition lawmakers holding up the very last session by maintaining nonsensical filibusters to the final moments.

Chief Secretary for Administration Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor expressed her disappointment with the final session of the fifth-term LegCo. She told reporters that normally there should be a farewell debate in the final session where lawmakers share their views or discuss their four-year tenure. This time, however, this would not happen because some “pan-democrat” politicians were blocking LegCo business from continuing by filibustering. Three significant bills scheduled for a vote that day, including the Medical Registration (Amendment) Bill 2016, were left in limbo when the day was over. This means they will have to go through the whole process all over again when the sixth-term LegCo begins in October.

Opposition lawmakers began disrupting the lawful administration of the SAR government with filibusters when the fourth-term LegCo was in office, but only a handful of them sponsored such motions. The fifth-term LegCo saw the opposition contingent out for “blood” day in and day out for four years. They not only made filibustering a routine practice but developed (in the later two years) a penchant for causing LegCo sessions to be aborted due to “no quorum”, which meant there were not enough lawmakers in the auditorium to reach a legitimate majority decision. Over the past four years LegCo sessions were interrupted more than 1,400 times by demands for a head count. This resulted in “no quorum” 18 times with a total of over 210 hours wasted. Thus, the SAR government withdrew some bills in the hope of having the more significant ones passed first. Sadly some bills, already through their second reading, had to be shelved temporarily because of frequent delays by a very determined minority.

There is no doubt such disruptive tactics should be effectively curbed soon for the sake of ensuring the normal operations of the executive branch, but how?

One of the opinions that have emerged recently maintains there are loopholes in the existing rules governing legislative procedures and the fifth-term president of LegCo was overly tolerant toward opposition lawmakers’ delaying tactics. This allows them to exploit the loopholes to the full in the final year of their term in office. As such it is necessary to elect a no-nonsense, hard-hitting president who will use the authority that comes with the job and cut short any delaying tactics when necessary, while seeing to it that the rules of procedure are revised to plug those loopholes.

Opinions like this are not complete nonsense but they do not address the core of the issue, The author is a senior research fellow of China Everbright Holdings.

All this irresponsible behavior reflects the fierce rivalry between the two dominant political camps and the rising discontent over the widening wealth gap and related social problems.”

either. Opposition lawmakers resorting to filibustering are a symptom of the worsening social and political atmosphere in Hong Kong. Radical lawmakers like Leung Kwok-hung, or “Long Hair”, have stepped up efforts to make their political battles against the establishment look like a personal vendetta against Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying and other principal officials. From name-calling to throwing objects at them, the abusive conduct toward SAR government officials made it almost natural for the introduction of filibusters in LegCo.

All this irresponsible behavior reflects the fierce rivalry between the two dominant political camps and the rising discontent over the widening wealth gap and related social problems. This means concentrating on changing house rules without resolving or at least lessening the much broader and deeper civic issues is a waste of time and energy — as it won’t work.

Let’s not forget this social tension has already given rise to separatist fantasies such as “selfdetermination” and “Hong Kong independence”, with a group of organizations advocating them. Their emergence is far more recent than the adoption of delaying tactics by the opposition camp in LegCo, but both are so disruptive they have to be dealt with immediately. However, between these two challenges the separatists’ attempt to grab LegCo seats should be stopped first as the LegCo election process is already in the nomination stage. We cannot afford to let separatists enter the LegCo race. All hell will break lose if even one of them wins. By then, whether the central government accepts the LegCo election results will not matter anymore, because the opposition camp will no doubt build on the upset win and try even harder to paralyze the SAR government as well as popularize separatism.