'Starry Lee Can Still Convene House Committee'

Pro-establishment politicians on Friday piled the pressure on embattled Civic Party legislator Dennis Kwok, suggesting he can be supplanted as the presiding officer of Legco’s paralysed House Committee, while council president Andrew Leung issued a rare statement saying the stalemate has prevented the legislature from properly exercising its constitutional functions.

The head of the Legislative Council’s committee on house rules, Paul Tse, suggested in the morning that the House Committee’s former chairperson, DAB leader Starry Lee, can take over from Kwok so long as the agenda is unrelated to the election of a new chairman.

Lee has not been presiding over House Committee meetings because she is running to chair the committee again, leaving last year’s vice-chairman, Kwok, to take charge.

Under his watch, the election of a new chair has been delayed time and time again, with the issue snowballing into a major political issue after Beijing officials issued high-profile statements earlier this week blaming the opposition for delaying Legco’s work.

The Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office even suggested that opposition lawmakers responsible for this might be in breach of their oaths of office, and constitute misconduct in public office.

Tse's suggestion was echoed by Liberal Party’s honorary chairwoman, Miriam Lau – also a former House Committee chair while she was a lawmaker.

Lau said Legco's rules of procedure state that the chairman's term will last until a new chair is elected. She said the rules are designed to avoid a "vacuum" in leadership, so she thinks Lee still has the power to convene and chair meetings when they are not electing a new chairman.

She said Lee could convene House Committee meetings to handle its duties first and put the election of a chairman at the bottom of the agenda.

Tse also said Kwok – a member of the Civic Party – can be replaced as the presiding officer by a representative of the Legco Secretariat when the body does choose a new leader.

Later on Friday, the committee –with Kwok presiding over the meeting – failed once again to elect a new chairman.

Afterwards, Legco President Andrew Leung issued a written statement over the row for the first time.

Leung has on multiple occasions spoken to reporters about the paralysed committee, but had up to now not issued any formal statement on paper.

“Under Article 73 of the Basic Law, enacting laws is one of the LegCo's primary powers and functions”, Leung noted.

“In half a year, [the House Committee] has yet to elect its chairman, rendering it unable to deal with dozens of bills and subsidiary legislation. This has severely impeded the operation of the Legco and the proper exercise of its constitutional functions.”

Leung described the situation as being “far from satisfactory”, adding that this has fallen short of public expectations, while appealing to all members to ”put aside their differences for the common good.”

Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung had also struck a similar note, speaking to reporters ahead of Friday’s meeting.

“The House Committee is an important cog in the Legislative Council. If this cog can’t function, the clock has to stop. A lot of issue related to people’s livelihood and the economy can’t move forward,” he said.

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