The creation of the Cut Waste Panel underscores the Government's resolve to continue delivering excellent public services despite increasing fiscal pressure. The Panel will be chaired by the Head of Civil Service, Mr Peter Ho, and comprise members drawn from the public, private and people sector. The Panel will consider all suggestions on where the Government can cut waste or remove frills.

The public demands quality public services. These come at a cost, which ultimately must be paid by the public through taxes, fees and charges. There must be consensus on how to ensure spending on public services represents good value for money and meets the needs of our people. The Panel encourages all members of the public to write in with their ideas on the public services which the Government should spend or cut back, as well as on areas where there could be savings.

The members of the Cut Waste Panel are:

When the Cut Waste Panel secretariat receives a suggestion, it will assess whether the suggestion concerns waste in the public sector. If a suggestion concerns private organisations, the secretariat will inform the suggestor that his ideas will be forwarded to the appropriate organisations and advise him to follow up with them. Sometimes, the secretariat receives complaints about poor service from public sector agencies, or proposals about devices that may reduce costs. For such cases, the secretariat will either respond directly to the suggestor or forward the case to the appropriate agencies for them to take note.

When the secretariat receives a suggestion about how the public sector can reduce waste, it will email it to the Deputy Secretary or Chief Executive Officer of the appropriate public sector agency or agencies and request a response. The email will be copied to the Permanent Secretary. To protect the identity of the suggestor, the secretariat will remove any text, e.g. email address, that could identify the suggestor. Agencies normally respond within 2 weeks, although complicated or ambiguous suggestions inevitably require more time, including additional correspondence between the agencies and the suggestor through the secretariat.

All suggestions and agency responses are cleared by the agency’s Permanent Secretary and reviewed by the Panel. If the Panel finds a response inadequate, it may direct the secretariat to work with the agency concerned to improve its response. Alternatively, the Panel may invite the head of the agency to a discussion about the particular issue.

For straightforward cases, the secretariat aims to respond to a suggestor within 22 days if he had provided a valid email address. Due to the volume of suggestions, email is the only feasible channel for the secretariat to send the response. As for follow-up correspondence on a suggestion, it is usually more efficient for a suggestor to correspond directly with the officer who signed the response. The secretariat therefore encourages suggestors to do so whenever possible.

The secretariat publishes the suggestions and responses on this website to help the public understand the work of the Cut Waste Panel. The record of the suggestions received so far shows that many are very similar, e.g. suggestions about switching off street lights. The secretariat therefore invites anyone who plans to make a suggestion to browse the published suggestions and responses or at least the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) first to see if the issue in question has already been raised and addressed.