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In November, Chief Executive Carrie Lam presented the 2020 Policy Address. A telephone survey was conducted from 8 to 15 December 2020 by the Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) to gauge public views on the Policy Address. It was found that a total of 58.9% of the respondents showed dissatisfaction towards the new Policy Address. Education was the policy area that found to be the most unsatisfactory, of which 63.6% of the respondents were dissatisfied.

 Major Findings

A total of 58.9% of the respondents showed dissatisfaction with the new Policy Address, 10.1% said they were satisfied and 27.3% answered ‘in-between’. The corresponding figures for last year’s survey on the 2019 Policy Address were 57.8%, 11.0%, and 28.7%, respectively. Statistical analysis (Chi-squared test) found that the differences between the two years were statistically insignificant. The corresponding figures for the 2018 Policy Address were 28.8%, 35.8%, and 33.6%, respectively. Statistical analysis (Chi-squared test) showed that the results for the 2020 Policy Address were significantly different from those for the 2018 Policy Address.

The respondents were also asked about their satisfaction level on selected policy areas in the 2020 Policy Address. For education, 11.3% of the respondents were satisfied, 21.4% answered ‘in-between’, and 63.6% expressed dissatisfaction. Concerning the area of housing and land supply, 6.4% were satisfied, 32.6% answered ‘in-between’ and 54.9% were dissatisfied. For the implementation of “One Country, Two Systems”, 16.8% expressed satisfaction. 21.8% answered ‘in-between’ and 54.6% expressed dissatisfaction. Whereas only 7.3% of the respondents were satisfied with policies in response to COVID-19, 36.8% answered ‘in-between’ and 53.9% were dissatisfied. In the area of employment, only 8.3% expressed satisfaction, 33.5% answered ‘in-between’ and 51.2% expressed dissatisfaction. Lastly, for the area of economy, 10.6% of the respondents showed satisfaction, 36.6% answered ‘in-between’ and 48.8% were dissatisfied.

The survey employed a dual-frame sampling design that included both landline and mobile phone numbers. A total of 709 respondents aged 18 or above (landline: 361; mobile: 348) were successfully interviewed, with response rates of 34.9% (landline) and 33.8% (mobile). The sampling error is estimated at plus or minus 3.68 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.[1]