Owing to its geographical position where Hong Kong and Mainland China are land locked at the New Territories, free crossing by Chinese between the land border of Hong Kong and China was historically permitted. Immigration control was only introduced in 1940 to stop the refugees fleeing China during the Sino-Japanese War from entering Hong Kong. This measure was suspended during the Second World War and revived in 1949.91
The 1949 border control was minimal in effect and basically Hong Kong had adopted the ‘Open Door’ policy on Chinese nationals from Mainland China. Anyone who evaded arrest at the border area could report to the immigration authorities in town to obtain permit to stay in Hong Kong. Between 1962 and 1972, about 60,000 Chinese persons entered into Hong Kong without permission and were subsequently permitted to stay.92
The ‘Cultural Revolution’ in China created another influx of refugees to Hong Kong and in 1973 alone, 56,000 illegal immigrants arrived Hong Kong from Mainland
90 Ibid.
91 Chan, J. (2009) ‘Immigration Policies and Human Resources Planning,’ in Siu, H. and Agnes, S.
(Eds.) Hong Kong Mobile: Making a Global Population. Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, p.
152.
92 Ibid, p. 159.
China. This prompted the Hong Kong Government to introduce the ‘Touch Base’ or
‘Reached Base’ policy on 30 November 1974.
“Under this policy, illegal immigrants who were arrested in the border region or in Hong Kong territorial waters during their attempt to enter Hong Kong would be repatriated, but all others who evaded immediate capture, entered the urban areas and subsequently gained a home with relatives or otherwise found proper accommodation would be given permission to stay in Hong Kong when they applied to the Immigration Department. The rationale of this policy was to avoid creating an illegal community of people living outside the law who could be exploited by employers and blackmailed by unscrupulous people and who might be compelled to live on the fringe of society and be drawn to crime as a means of survival.”93
The problem of illegal immigration remained in the 1970s. In 1979, 89,000 illegal immigrants from China were arrested on arrival and repatriated whereas another 107,000 had successfully evaded capture and reached base and allowed to stay. To stop the flow of the illegal immigrants, the Hong Kong Government abolished the
‘Touch Base’ policy on 23 October 1980 and all illegal immigrants arrived after this date would be repatriated.94 In addition, there were two Sections included in the Immigration (Amendment) (No 2) Ordinance 1980 requiring all Hong Kong residents over the age of fifteen to carry in person their Hong Kong identity cards and prohibiting the employment of illegal immigrants.95
93 Ibid.
94 In 1979-80, around 170,000 illegal immigrants from Mainland China were arrested and repatriated.
The Hong Kong Government on October 1980 abolished the ‘Touch Base’ policy whereas illegal immigrants from Mainland China before this date could be registered and stay in Hong Kong if they had reached the city and were not being arrested at the border area.
95 Chan, J. (2009) op cit., p. 160.
When the Hong Kong Government launched its massive infra-structure building projects after 1989 preparing for Hong Kong’s handing over, many illegal immigrants came to Hong Kong to look for employment. The Government therefore established sentencing guidelines for imprisoning illegal workers caught in Hong Kong to fifteen months imprisonment in 1990 as deterrence. The immediate effect of this sentencing guideline was the rise in penal population and the severe overcrowding in penal institutions, especially institutions holding females. In 1990, illegal immigrants from China constituted about 40% of the total prison population. Despite this harsh sentence, there were still some 3,100 illegal immigrants from China serving sentence in Hong Kong in 1991 constituted 30% of the penal population.96
Another important issue arising from this influx of illegal immigrants was the number of female illegal immigrants coming to Hong Kong and a large number of them were involved in the sex industry. They were arrested and sentenced not for their involvement as sex workers but mainly for ’breach of condition of stay’, a measure which was described as ‘bureaucratic justice’ by Laidler, et.al. (2007).97
Statistics from the Correctional Services Department showed that the total number of females sentenced by court and admitted to penal institutions had increased from 944 in 1986 to 1,287 in 1991 and 3,966 in 1996. The number of male prisoner admissions had also increased during this period but the rate was not as high as the female prisoners, i.e., 9,718 in 1986, 12,361 in 1991 and 13,654 in 1996.98 This high
96 Hong Kong Hansard, 23 October 1991, pp. 38-45.
97 Laidler, K., et. al. (2007) ‘Bureaucratic Justice: The Incarceration of Mainland Chinese Women Working in Hong Kong’s Sex Industry’, International Journal of Offender Therapy and Comparative Criminology, Volume 51 Number 1, pp. 68-83.
98 See Table 8.3, ‘Sentenced Persons Admitted into Penal Institutions by Age Group and Sex’ in Census and Statistics Department, (2011) Women and Men in Hong Kong, Key Statistics 2011 Edition, p. 218.
admission rate had push up the overall penal population for both male and female prisoners. The average daily penal population for all sentenced female prisoners jumped from 676 in 1991 to 1,438 in 1996 and for male sentenced prisoners, the average daily population was increased from 9,407 in 1991 to 10,011 in 1996. As to the prisoner composition, female prisoners from Mainland China had outnumbered the local female prisoners by around four to one in 1996. 99
2.8 Conclusion
This Chapter has traced the path of the development of the prison services in Hong Kong from immediately after the post-War days until 1997 when Hong Kong was no longer under British administration.
The end of the Pacific War in 1945 had given the Prisons Department in Hong Kong the opportunity to have a fresh start. Most of the experienced prison staff were replaced by local staff after the War. A few senior British prison officers had rebuilt the Department at the time when resources were in short supply and the prisons in Hong Kong were being used as warehouses for the destitute and poor in addition to those committed for criminal offences.
The prisons services had always been considered an important agency by the colonial service in the maintenance of law and order in the colonies. Until late 1960s, the Colonial Office was still actively monitoring the work of the colonial prison service
99 Figures obtained from Commissioner of Correctional Services Department, Departmental Annual Reports, 1986, 1991 and 1996.
through its Advisory Committees. In Part II of this thesis, more discussion will be given on the roles of the Colonial Office in shaping Hong Kong’s penal policies.
At operational level, Hong Kong was under strong British influence and had maintained very close linkage with Britain in particular the recruitment and training of senior officers and European officers for the Prisons Department. These arrangements had ensured the elites in the Hong Kong Prisons Department were in full conveyance with the penal philosophies and practices in England. Prison Ordinances and Prison Rules covering the work of the HM Prison Service were adopted in Hong Kong if there were no contradictions with the local situation.
With the shrinking of the British Empire in the 1960s and the deletion of the Colonial Office in 1969, the Prisons Department, along with the other Government departments in Hong Kong, began to pick up pace in the localisation process. This however did not prevent the Prisons Department from seeking professional advices from the Home Office and transporting British penal management philosophy from the HM Prisons Service as evident from the aftermath of the 1973 Stanley Prison riot.
On the other hand, the removal of the Colonial Office had enabled the Prisons Department to have more flexibility in the selection and adaptation of penal practices both within and outside England.
As illustrated in this Chapter, the Prisons Department in Hong Kong had gone through tremendous changes since 1945. Progressive English penal practices in the management of prisoners were introduced to Hong Kong in the 1950s and 1960s. This Chapter also discussed how the Prisons Department had shift from the English welfare model to that of a deterrent tool in maintaining law and order in Hong Kong
during the 1970s following the rise of crimes in Hong Kong and the 1973 Stanley Prison riot.
This shift towards discipline and control in Hong Kong’s penal system received no opposition from the community. On the other hand, this highly regimented environment had provided a stable platform for the Prisons Department to develop rehabilitation programmes for the offenders under custody, leading to the change of the name of the Prisons Department to Correctional Services Department on 1 February 1982.
With the strain on resources in dealing with the Vietnamese refugees, the uncertain future of the Department after 1997 and the apparent effective penal programmes that were in place in the 1980s, there were no longer any urgent needs to follow changes that occurred in the British penal system thereafter. Hong Kong’s penal system remained to adopt the Framework Agreement of prison management and re-integration by maintaining order and discipline within the penal establishments as primary task followed by the rehabilitation of offenders. By 1997, the Correctional Services Department had grown into a key government department in Hong Kong earning international reputation in the management and rehabilitation of offenders.
The following two Chapters will describe in detail how young offenders and adult offenders were being managed in Hong Kong from 1945 to 1997.