Working plan: Acting Chief Secretary Stephen Lam says the Government will conclude, summarise, and classify the views collected in the 2012 constitutional development consultation exercise.

Acting Chief Secretary Stephen Lam welcomes people's response to the proposed 2012 constitutional development package, adding the Government will conclude, summarise, and classify the views collected in the consultation exercise.

Speaking to reporters at the close of the three-month consultation today, Mr Lam said as of this morning, more than 40,000 written submissions and 1.6 million signatures had been received. The Federation of Hong Kong Guangdong Community Organisations also handed in several hundred letters this afternoon.

"Our working timetable is that we hope to complete the process of putting a proposal on amending Appendix I and II of the Basic Law to the Legislative Council and for lawmakers to vote on the proposal before the summer recess in 2010."

The Government will then put forward and enact amendments to the Chief Executive Election Ordinance and the Legislative Council Ordinance during the 2010-11 legislative year.

He said this will leave sufficient time to properly organise the Chief Executive and Legislative Council elections.

Constructive communication

Mr Lam today also met with representatives of the Association for Democracy & People's Livelihood and Democratic Party.

He said the ADPL, at this juncture, does not insist on the immediate abolishment of the functional constituencies. The group also supports the proposal for elected District Councillors to select from among themselves a number of legislators for the 2012 LegCo.

"There has been communication between the Government and the Democratic Party. We have also had contact with the Alliance for Universal Suffrage initiated by the Democratic Party and a group of academics.

"We believe that such mutual contact is conducive to rolling forward Hong Kong's democracy in the sense that this will be helpful to building consensus within our community.

"Through concerted efforts, we hope that in the coming months we would actually be able to roll forward democracy for Hong Kong in 2012 and attain this consensus for the future of Hong Kong."