PRICE: 1.00
ANNUAL
DEPARTMENTAL
REPORTS
1959-60
DIRECTOR OF
INFORMATION SERVICES
59672
ACC
CLASS NO. HKS
AUTHOR NO 143
REBOUND
im ....
HKS
14·3
HONG KONG
ANNUAL DEPARTMENTAL REPORT
BY THE
DIRECTOR OF INFORMATION SERVICES
FOR THE
FINANCIAL YEAR 1959-60
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY W. F. C. JENNER, GOVERNMENT PRINTER
AT THE GOVERNMENT PRESS, JAVA ROAD, HONG KONG
EXCHANGE RATES
When dollars are quoted in this Report, they are, unless otherwise stated, Hong Kong dollars. The official rate for conversion to pounds sterling is HK$16=£1 (HK$1=1s. 3d.). The official rate for conversion to U.S. dollars is HK$5.714=US$1 (based on £1=US$2.80).
:
GENERAL
STAFF
PRESS ROOM
RADIO NEWS ROOM
PUBLICITY
LIBRARY
4
FILM LIBRARY
FILM CENSORSHIP
CONTENTS
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Paragraphs
1 - 7
T
8 - 9
10 - 14
. 15 - 16
. 17 - 23
24
25
26
...
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GENERAL
THE main event in the Department for the year was the decision of the Government to expand the establishment from a total staff of 53 to one of 95 and to increase the Other Charges budget proportionately. At the same time, the Department's title was changed from Public Relations Office to Information Services Department and that of the Public Relations Officer himself to Director of Information Services. Although no actual additions were made to the staff, except on the secretarial and clerical side, some changes of organization were made, new equipment was bought and a general increase in publicity was achieved to match the gradually-changing pattern of work required of the Department.
2. In June, the Department moved out of the Gloucester Building and into the newly-built West Wing of the Central Government Offices. The new accommodation (on the fifth and sixth floors) provides more spacious Press and Radio rooms, new photographic studios and dark- rooms, a production studio and improved projection rooms and offices.
3. As in previous years, there were many visitors from overseas, and it is gratifying that Hong Kong now attracts a very full share of the attention of the growing number of reporters, commentators and photographers who take advantage of facilities for air travel as they improve year by year; Hong Kong is situated at the Far Eastern junc- tion of several round-the-world routes. The demand for information about Hong Kong in the world at large is still far from satisfied; only Africa and Latin America have yet to discover us.
4. The Department continued to handle the press relations of all other departments of the Hong Kong Government, as well as to issue statements of policy and information on behalf of the Government as a whole. Press arrangements at public functions are generally made by this Department.
5. Ten television teams shot films in Hong Kong during the year ----one British (ITV), three American, one Canadian, one Italian, one West German, one Swiss and one for the United Nations. Five cinemato- graph feature films were shot by overseas companies-British, Indian,
1
American, Italian, Philippine-and two documentaries were made by welfare organizations.
6. Feature articles about Hong Kong are known to have been written by visiting journalists and published in Britain (about a score), in the U.S.A. (another score), in Australia, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Malaya, Thailand, Vietnam and Japan. The London Daily Mail and the Sydney Morning Herald both published special supple- ments on Hong Kong. Hong Kong was no doubt mentioned in many more features devoted to the Far East as a whole by the five hundred or so journalists who passed through in organized parties, and its social problems were highlighted in many countries in support of appeals for money for World Refugee Year. Various engineering achievements of Hong Kong were the subject of articles in technical journals overseas. 7. The Department also drafted an illustrated White Paper on Drug Addiction in Hong Kong for the approval of the Advisory Committee on Narcotics; it was published in English and Chinese.
STAFF
8. The Director (formerly Public Relations Officer), Mr. J. L. MURRAY, was at his post until three weeks from the end of the year, when he went on leave. Mr. J. D. DUNCANSON, the Deputy Director, took charge for the duration of his absence. Mr. S. S. KNOWLES, formerly Press Officer, was on leave until the 28 October, when he returned to duty as Radio News Editor under the reorganization. Mr. D. N. WILLIS acted as Press Officer throughout the year. Mr. William FISH was appointed Features Writer and took up his duties on 1st July; the post had been vacant for almost a year.
9. The first steps in the reorganization were taken during the latter part of the financial year, but it was not possible to fill any of the new vacancies in either the Press or the Publicity Division. The main feature of the reorganization-apart from a general reinforcement in numbers-is the allocation of work between these two Divisions; the former, under a Chief Press Officer, were subdivided into a Press Room and a Radio News Room and the latter, without any head, were subdivided into Films & Photography, Publications and Production sections. All the offices in the Department below that of Chief Press Officer, except the administrative ones and the Film Censors, have been graded, in accordance with United Kingdom practice, as Principal
2
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Information Officer, Senior Information Officer, Information Officer, Assistant Information Officer Class I or Assistant Information Officer Class II.
PRESS DIVISION
PRESS ROOM
10. The routine functions of the Press Room continued to be the issue to the Press of the Daily Information Bulletin and other statements and reports (all in both Chinese and English) on behalf of the Govern- ment and individual departments; the making of digests of the Chinese press for official use; and the arrangement of press visits, interviews and conferences. The Press Room is manned by English-speaking and Chinese-speaking staff twenty hours a day, the off-duty hours being from 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. After 10 p.m., staff have to be available to answer queries raised by the editorial staffs of the next morning's papers before going to press.
11. The volume of material of different sorts issued to the Press was a little less than last year, but its journalistic quality improved still further. Just under 10,000 items of news were issued in the Daily Information Bulletin. The worldwide cover given by the wire-service news agencies can never be ascertained, but records are kept of use by local papers; this varies from use by only one or two papers to thirty or more, the average during this year lying between seven and eight, the same as last year. Police reports of traffic accidents, robberies and so on are issued separately from the Daily Information Bulletin, and 2,060 items were put out during the year in three hundred-odd more or less daily bulletins. A little over a hundred photographs, plans and diagrams to illustrate press announcements were issued, and on the average these were reproduced in six or more newspapers each, which was about the same average as last year.
12. The Department also issues a great deal of United Kingdom and Commonwealth news received by cable or post from the Central Office of Information. The items that are not topical and so do not get tele- graphed by the agencies can still get good publicity in Hong Kong, especially the services known as 'Colco" (news of the Commonwealth) and 'Feastco' (news selected as of special interest for the Far East). These and other less ephemeral items of news from London are issued by the Department in almost daily bulletins of the London Press Service. Associated with this service is one of feature articles, sometimes with photographs, by writers in the United Kingdom. Nearly 700 feature
3
articles were offered to Hong Kong editors for locally exclusive publica- tion during the year; one in six got into print.
13. The Press Room's machinery for distribution was also placed at the disposal of the Press Relations Officers of the three Services, the British Council and the Committee of the Festival of the Arts.
14. The Press Section organized half a dozen press-facility visits and two press conferences.
RADIO NEWS ROOM
15. The Radio News Room was not separated from the Press until nearly the end of the year; eventually the Radio News Editor is to have his own staff, but at present shares them with the Press Room.
16. During the last month of the year, plans were made, as one of the essential parts of the reorganization, for the compilation by the Department of all locally-produced news bulletins in Chinese and English for broadcasting in Hong Kong. Hitherto this has been done only for Radio Hong Kong, but in future a similar service will be provided for Rediffusion, television and Commercial Broadcasting. (This change does not affect the relaying of English-language bulletins from the overseas services of the British Broadcasting Corporation and Australian Broadcasting Commission.)
PUBLICITY
17. The biggest single item of publicity of the year was the com- missioning of a half-hour prestige film in colour to promote knowledge of Hong Kong and its problems abroad. The film is to be called This is Hong Kong and is the first of its kind made for the Hong Kong Government, although other prestige films about Hong Kong have been made quite recently by the Central Office of Information and for the Hong Kong Tourist Association. Shooting for This is Hong Kong was completed shortly before the end of the year.
18. Preparations were being made at the end of the year to start making films in the Department's own studios in connexion with social-education campaigns as soon as staff should be engaged. As new cameras and other equipment began to arrive, the range of photo- graphic work was extended and the output of photographs still further increased; 2,800 were distributed (accompanied by fully descriptive captions) during the year locally and overseas, for use chiefly in unofficial periodicals.
4
19. The number of full-length feature articles suitable for magazines or newspapers written in the Department-mostly in the last few months of the year-also increased to 20. These were generally accompanied by picture-sets and were placed overseas through the good offices of the Central Office of Information in London and the British Information Services in New York.
20. A gratifyingly successful broadsheet telling the story of Hong Kong refugees was designed, mainly for distribution through the Hong Kong World Refugee Year Committee's correspondents abroad. An edition of 140,000 copies was printed in a wallsheet format and 100,000 copies were printed in folder size. A second edition of A Problem of People was brought out. Folders were designed for such widely different subjects as fire-prevention, the care of teeth, the forthcoming census, the perils of heroin-smoking, how to buy tax-reserve certificates, etc., etc. The Department did the production work for the 1960 Highway Code and designed posters, painting books and 'flicker books' in connexion with the Road-Safety Exhibition.
21. 'Miss Ping On' continued her constantly-changing exhortations to cleanliness about the home, especially through the annual 'Ping On' Competition in the resettlement estates. The annual medical campaign to encourage prophylactic inoculations-especially against diphtheria- was designed through leaflets, posters, cinema slides and figurine incentives.
22. A general poster, with a blank space for over-printing from time to time, was produced to advertise the Colony's exhibits at inter- national trade fairs. Other annually-recurring posters were produced for the Agricultural Show, the Police Review and economy in the use of water, and a poster and catalogue were made for the British Technical Achievement Exhibition. Help was also given to one or two other departments with their displays at various exhibitions. Finally, the Department chose and arranged, as year by year, the illustrations in the Colony Annual Report, which is the principal vehicle for informa- tion about Hong Kong overseas.
23. All government advertising is placed by the Department and this year cost $200,000 for 700 advertisements, including announcements in American, Australian and British periodicals of impending sales of land.
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LIBRARY
24. The stock of books and other reference material about Hong Kong available to journalists and other callers was further expanded, and notable additions were made to the catalogued collection of photo- graphs.
FILM LIBRARY
25. One hundred and fifteen new films were added to the library. The library had to suspend loans for six weeks during the office removal in the middle of the year, and this was reflected in reduced borrowings at 1,861, seen by audiences totalling 684,296. British Television News was received weekly through the year and screened on Rediffusion's wired-vision service, as well as a number of British-way-of-life documentaries.
FILM CENSORSHIP
26. Details of films censored before public exhibition are shown in the appendix to this Report. Again there was a slight fall in the total number of features, but a disproportionate fall in films imported from America. This was partly offset by increases from other countries, especially Japan.
June, 1960.
J. D. DUNCANSON,
Acting Director of Information Services.
6
Total submitted
Passed clean
Country of Origin
FEATURE FILMS (35 mm)
APPENDIX
FILMS CENSORED DURING THE PERIOD 1.4.59 TO 31.3.60
BOARD OF REVIEW
PANEL OF CENSORS
Passed with cuts
Not passed
Total Appeals
Passed clean
Passed with cuts
Not passed
China (Mainland)
16
13
1
2
N
I
East Germany
2
1
I
France
25
21
1
Franco Italian
6
5
1
Hong Kong (Chinese Mandarin)
68
65
2
1
(Chinese Cantonese)
166
154
(Chinese Miscellaneous)
5
5
Hungary
1
1
India
32
32
Italy...
17
15
1
1
Japan
57
43
10
4
2
1
Mexico
1
Philippines
2
2
South Korea
I
Taiwan
1
1
United Kingdom
57
51
1
U.S.A.
183
168
LO ON
5
2
5
U.S.S.R.
12
12
-
U.S.S.R. China (Mainland)
1
1
5
5
2
Էջ
1
West Germany
Unascertainable
FEATURE FILMS (16 mm)
United Kingdom
U.S.A.
•
NEWSREELS
Hong Kong .. United Kingdom U.S.A.
SHORTS
Belgium
China (Mainland) France
Hong Kong
::
2
NN
12
2
12
8
∞
52
52
105
99
110
1
1
95
86
3
6
2
2
1
14
14
Italy..
Japan
Portugal
4
4
14
13
•
3
2
12
212
1,677 21
313
Taiwan
FOR
United Kingdom
U.S.A.
U.S.S.R.
West Germany
TELEVISION (Rediffusion)
Films (16 mm)
Films (35 mm
Rediffusion Newsreels
In addition 115 advertising films were censored during period under review.
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3
1
1
1
1
12
210
8
3
1,671
21 309
Ale
2
1
1
4
HỌNG KONG
Code No.: 3043-60