Tuesday 12th February 2013

Dear Reader,

Kung Hei Fat Choy! It's that special time of year when officials hand out bribes in red packets to journalists in broad daylight - rather like offering them privileged access to HKIDs under the Companies Ordinance. After 4 days off, you've probably spent enough time eating with your families, so today we have two closely-related articles to chew on.

NEW ARTICLES
HKIDs and Government secrecy
Webb-site calls on Government to abandon plans to restrict access to HKIDs, and instead to promote their use as unique identifiers of individuals and eliminate their misuse as authenticators. A media exemption would imply media controls. We launch an index of HKIDs which are already on the web. The Companies Registry and Land Registry should tear down the pay-wall and provide open online access to all documents. (12-Feb-2013)

Submission to HK Ombudsman on access to information and records management
Webb-site calls for a Freedom of Information Ordinance, to include provisions on government record-keeping. There should be an online freely accessible archive of records, and pay-walls on registries should be demolished. Government claims to copyright should also be scrapped - we have already paid for what they produce, and it should not be commercial anyway. (12-Feb-2013)

RECENTLY ON WEBB-SITE
BSD and SSD 2.0 - submission to LegCo
We dissect the proposed Buyer's Stamp Duty and increase and expansion of Special Stamp Duty on residential properties in HK. Government replies to Webb-site reveal that they don't actually have data to support the discrimination between Permanent Residents and Non-PRs, even if the duty were constitutional, which it is not. (5-Feb-2013)

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