What would the UK’s Count Binface do if he were in Hong Kong? OK, he would possibly be in prison for subverting state power, inciting hatred of the government, or colluding with foreign powers (he’s from another planet, after all). But that aside, what would he make of my local streetside waste receptacle situation?
The pic shows my neighbourhood green bin on a good day: bits of crap balanced precariously on other bits of crap. Usually, it’s worse: boxes on either side overflow with similar pyramids of refuse.
It wasn’t always like this. There used to be an orange bin across the road, which was emptied daily. Then the Orange Bin (‘Food and Environmental Hygiene’) Dept took it away, leaving the one in the sitting-out area (run by the Green Bin or ‘Leisure and Cultural Services’ Dept) to take the strain.
The Orange Bin Dept removed many bins around Hong Kong as part of preparations for their exciting Municipal Solid Waste Charging initiative, under which households and businesses would pay for special pre-paid garbage bags. After numerous false starts, and expenditure of several hundred million bucks, the idea was abandoned because highly paid officials couldn’t work out how to convince people to accept it. (Japan, Taiwan and South Korea have used such a system for years. It’s almost as if having democratically elected municipal governments leads to better public input into policy-making and gives leaders a mandate to get things done.)
The Orange Bin Dept never reinstalled the bins it removed, and the Green Bin Dept hasn’t increased the frequency of its receptacle-emptying – much to the delight of the local pigeons.
On a brighter note: Orange Bin Dept boss Tse Chin-wan recently won Sing Tao‘s Leader of the Year award, in the Community/Public Affairs/Environment & Conservation (of pigeons?) category.
HKFP op-ed on the case of Ami Chan – found with laser pointers and spray paint at the age of 15 in 2019, and arrested now, in 2026…
I express no opinion about Ms Chan’s guilt or innocence, on which the magistrate is now pondering. I do believe that having fallen so far below the standards expected of prosecutions in cases involving children, the Department of Justice should not have brought this case at all.
The department’s guidelines for prosecutors (echoing numerous human rights instruments, including our local one) say that defendants are entitled to a trial within a reasonable time. What the department’s denizens seem to have trouble getting their heads round is that this may vary with the age of the accused.