Publicity of government policies and measures - (2015/05/27)

Following is a question by the Hon Yiu Si-wing and awritten reply by the Acting Secretary for Home Affairs, Ms Florence Hui, in theLegislative Council today (May 27):

Question:

 At present, various policy bureaux publicise andpromote their policies and measures through a number of channels. In this connection,will the Government inform this Council:

(1) of the respective expenditures incurred by various policybureaux last year on publicising policies and measures, with a breakdown bypublicity means (including (i) television announcement in the public interest,(ii) radio announcement, (iii) newspaper supplement, (iv) outdoor publicityactivity, (v) Internet and (vi) social media) according to Annex 1;

(2) whether it regularly assesses the effectiveness of thepublicity work of various policy bureaux; if it does, of the assessmentcriteria and outcome of the last assessment; if not, the reasons for that; and

(3) how the authorities tackle the situation where thepublicity work is not cost-effective?

Reply:

President, 

 We have consulted relevant policy bureaux on theenquiry raised by the Hon Yiu and our consolidated reply is as follows:

(1) Expenditures of various policy bureaux in 2014-15 onpublicity of policy measures are provided in Annex 2.

(2) and (3) When carrying out publicity initiatives, policybureaux will, having regard to the objectives and actual circumstances of suchinitiatives, collect responses via different means to assess the effectivenessof the publicity initiatives for reference for mapping out publicity andpromotional strategies in future. Generally speaking, policy bureaux may, intheir assessing the effectiveness of the publicity initiatives, consider suchfactors as the number of programme participants or service users, opinions fromtarget groups or relevant stakeholders, relevant press commentaries andreports, number of hotline enquiries, hit rates of webpages and content ofsubmissions received.

 Policy bureaux are tasked with prudent and effectiveuse of allocated funding to take forward various areas of work, includingpublicity initiatives, under their respective policy portfolios. Their keyareas of work and performance will also be reported in the ControllingOfficer's Reports for the relevant year. In addition, in their annual budgetingexercises, policy bureaux will examine the priorities of various tasks andprepare budgets for the following year, including the budgets for publicityinitiatives. Taking into account cost-effectiveness and other relevant factors,they will consider making necessary revision to the budgets.