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Phone ban breaches Basic Law?
Article 25 of the Basic Law says all Hong Kong residents (including officers) shall be equal before the law. Article 30 of the Basic Law says freedom and privacy of communication of HK residents (including officers) shall be protected by law.
No department or individual may, on any grounds, infringe upon the freedom and privacy of communication of residents, except when relevant authorities may inspect communications in accordance with legal procedures to meet the needs of public security or investigate a criminal offence.
I wonder why all Uniform Branch officers on duty and in uniform are not allowed to carry their own portable phones. Do Police Orders precede the Basic Law? Portable phones are not prohibitive articles, dangerous drugs or offensive weapons. UB officers on duty in uniform are allowed to carry cigarettes and lighters but why no phones?
Do senior UB officers carry and use portable phones on duty and in uniform?
Chung Man-fai
Senior Inspector Western Division
Support Wing responds . . .
The inquiry was referred to the Human Rights Unit of the Department of Justice which has considered the issue at length.
It has been reassured that the restriction on the carriage of mobile phones and/or pagers by officers on duty does not constitute any unlawful or arbitrary interference with their privacy.
Officers on duty, whether in plainclothes or uniform, are required to devote their full attention to carrying out the Force's statutory duties. Attending to personal calls received through phones and pagers, for which the officers have no permission to carry, distracts them from their constabulary duties. An officer who does not have permission to carry them can always be contacted in a personal emergency through their beat radio and can always make telephone calls for private purposes at appropriate times by using public facilities. There is therefore no infringement of any privacy of communication.
The Force currently has a large number of mobile phones and pagers which are either issued to individual officers with a proven operational requirement, or held as operational reserve for frontline officers. Officers who are issued with Force mobiles and pagers, and those who have been authorised by their Formation Commanders to carry them, may therefore use the equipment while on duty.
Law Cheuk-hung
for Chief Superintendent (Support)
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