Fast-aging HK warrants prompt action: Chair
Long term planning needed now to treat aging population: Chan
policy, an elderly policy and a “super policy bureau” with its own budget to handle affairs touching on the lives of senior citizens. He also believes the age of retirement needs to be raised, and retirement benefits correspondingly increased.
In an exclusive interview with China Daily, Chan, who is also chair-professor of social gerontology at Lingnan University, urged the government to devise a holistic, long-term population policy.
“It should not just comprise the size of population, but also its structure, its working population and its manpower planning — in line with Hong Kong’s long-term goal,” he pointed out.
In 2041, the proportion of elderly people will reach 30 percent of the local population. At the same time, another 20 percent will be made up of children under 16. That means half the population will be dependent. “The elderly proportion is very high and such a population structure is rather unhealthy,” he commented.
To ease the aging population problem, Chan believes children born in Hong Kong to mainland parents should be absorbed so as to bring more young people into the population. He revealed that when Henry Tang was chief secretary, the government considered allowing those children to come to Hong Kong as early as possible to become familiar with life here. But the study was never published.
“The proposal is rather controversial,” he admitted. “But I think there is no problem because those children are Chinese. You know, many local couples are unwilling to have babies.”
The professor also proposed a holistic elderly policy, commenting: “There are only piecemeal arrangements, such as increasing the Old Age Allowance to HK$ 2,200 and the advance implementation of the HK$ 2 traffic fare scheme.”
He said in Hong Kong, support for the elderly is treated as welfare, with the Labour and Welfare Bureau as policy-maker and the Social Welfare Department as executor in a top-down manner.
“Instead of promoting the image of the elderly in a positive way, such as their experience and contribution to society, the government simply projects them as service recipients,” he commented. “In fact, many elderly are still very healthy, energetic and have good financial strength. The government should formulate and promote a positive elderly policy in conjunction with housing, health, education, employment policies and communication with young people.”
An elderly policy, according to Chan, is a multi-policy, crossdepartmental effort which is being handled by a “super policy bureau” above other bureaus as in foreign countries such as Singapore and Canada.
“Whether we will have a super bureau for elderly affairs in Hong Kong largely hinges on Chief Executive CY Leung,” he said. “Given that this is a cross-bureau mechanism, Chief Secretary Carrie Lam is the most suitable person to lead this super bureau with her high calibre.”