Some activists have launched a $1 million campaign against the Government's plan to turn the Tamar site into a civic core. They have branded the Tamar project a white elephant.

With the help of an associate professor, the opponents to the project have alleged that the future Tamar development would be 94% more expensive than the second phase of IFC in Central. This has formed the basis of their white elephant campaign.

The lecturer has subsequently conceded to the media that he had overlooked the fact that the Tamar development also comprises two hectares of open space and other amenities. He, however, insisted that the fact was not revealed in our papers for the Legislative Council.

The fact is the information has been in the public domain and is only a few clicks away on the internet. We have also challenged the validity of the IFC figures he cited. So far, the scholar has remained silent on this point.  The activists have opted nevertheless to press ahead with their campaign.

At present, offices of the government bureaux and the Legislative Council are scattered over Admiralty and Central. The need for a modern, centralised office complex has been well established. There will also be significant savings in rentals once the policy-making bureaus are relocated to the future Government Headquarters.

Opinion poll

The South China Morning Post's opinion poll published last Monday also confirmed that the people saw the need for a new government headquarters. Fifty-six percent of the respondents appreciated this need. The paper also asked: "Do you think the new government headquarters, including a new Legislative Council complex, should take up the Tamar site?" Almost half of the answers were in the affirmative.

In reply, we pointed out to the SCMP that half of the Tamar site would be earmarked as open space for the public to enjoy the harbour view. Coupled with the future waterfront promenade, this open space will be even larger than the Hong Kong Park.

We specifically pointed to this anomaly in the way the question was framed to the Post. For unknown reasons, it chose not to carry this point in its front-page splash. It is puzzling why it has not asked a fairer question - "Do you think the new government headquarters, a new Legislative Council complex and an open space should take up the Tamar site?"

It is reasonable to assume that the tally in favour will rise in response to this straightforward representation of what the Tamar civic core is.

The Tamar idea was first raised in 1998. Since then, we have been discussing with concerned parties about how best to develop the precious site.

Facts ignored

Individual critics have accused us of lack of consultation. However, when we explain the facts to them, some of them are as deaf as a post. A councillor claimed in RTHK's Letter to Hong Kong that our air quality assessments were based on the assumption that the vicinity of the site was flat. We explained to the councillor that this was not the case. But the letter was subsequently reprinted in full in the publication of a political party. Our request for the publication to carry our clarification has been ignored.

Another councillor has accused the Government of misleading the public by understating the density of the development. We affirmed to him that the plot ratio for the scheme would be 5.7, in line with the statutory definition for plot ratio.  The accusation was unfounded.

More recently, rumors have it that the Government had approached developers to turn the current so-called Government Hill into a commercial scheme. This is absolutely groundless.

Dioxin dialogue

The issue of dioxin is another case in point. NOW pay-TV first quoted an anonymous Beijing source as saying that the State Environmental Protection Administration of China was concerned about the dioxin level at Tamar. It then went on to quote an environmental expert in length. The national agency has flatly denied that it had made such comments.

A few days later, the expert claimed that samples he collected over a decade ago had contained high levels of dioxin. According to a councillor who has read the report, the dioxin level was claimed to be three times over the permitted level.

What the councillor has failed to understand is the fact that there is an international standard which portrays the level of "toxicity equivalent" so as to enable a meaningful comparison of toxicity of different mixtures of dioxins.

Based on the expert's own data, the dioxin concentration converted to "toxicity equivalent" is around 0.01 ppb TEQ, which was far below the remedial action level of 1 ppb TEQ as internationally recognized.

Other examples abound. The opponents' case is built primarily on hearsay, rumors and half-truths. It will be a real waste of land resources should we allow the Tamar site to remain idle, which unfortunately has already been the case for eight years.

This was Acting Chief Secretary Michael Suen's article published in the South China Morning Post on June 19.