Hong Kong is set to raise the hourly minimum wage by 4.5 per cent to HK$41.8, local media have reported citing sources.
The Minimum Wage Commission will also reportedly review the amount annually going forward, rather than every two years. The adjustment would come after years of calls from labour activists for more frequent assessments to keep pace with inflation.
The city’s minimum wage is currently set at HK$40. It was most recently raised by HK$2.50 last year after remaining frozen at HK$37.50 since 2019, with Chief Executive John Lee saying he wanted to thank workers for their “important contributions to the country and the society’s prosperous development.”
In 2021, the government cited the poor and uncertain economic outlook, and the “elevated unemployment rate,” when announcing that the minimum wage would remain unchanged.
According to local media reports, the commission will also adopt a new formula that would not allow the minimum wage to be cut.
Hong Kong introduced a minimum wage law in 2011, when it was set at HK$28. Since then, the income of low-paid employees “has improved continuously while Hong Kong’s overall competitiveness has remained strong,” the chairperson of the Minimum Wage Commission Priscilla Wong said in a statement on the commission’s website.
There were 143,000 people in the city earning the minimum wage in mid-2021, the latest period for which statistics were available. They worked in areas such as security, cleaning services and retail, according to the Minimum Wage Commission.
Calls to scrap min. wage
Ahead of Labour Day on Wednesday, lawmakers and industry leaders have weighed in on the city’s minimum wage.
The pro-Beijing Hong Kong Federation of Trade Unions (HKFTU) chair suggested on Sunday that the minimum wage be reviewed annually: “The main purpose of the minimum wage is to be a policy safety net, to ensure grassroots or the most disadvantaged local workers receive appropriate protection,” Kingsley Wong said, according to RTHK.
Liberal Party legislator Tommy Cheung of the catering sector had suggested that the minimum wage hurt the city’s competitiveness and should be scrapped. But Wong said such policies were commonplace elsewhere: “Around the world, many countries and regions in the West and Asia have a minimum wage, so the minimum wage must be an appropriate measure then.”
‘Celebrations’ in lieu of protests, says union
Traditionally a day of protest for both pro-establishment and pro-democracy labour rights activists, Wednesday’s Labour Day is not expected to see street marches or rallies calling for the protection of workers.
The HKFTU said last week that it would not be organising a march. It will instead meet with Chief Executive John Lee and other officials, and hold a petition outside the government headquarters.
The party – which used to hold annual Labour Day marches – said it could express their demands through “celebrations” instead.
Hong Kong last saw large-scale Labour Day marches in 2019, before the Beijing-imposed national security law came into effect.
Last year, two former members of the defunct Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU) – once the city’s largest pro-democracy union coalition – applied for police approval to organise a public demonstration on Labour Day.
But the planned march was scrapped after one of its organisers, Joe Wong, was said to have gone missing for four hours. Later, another organiser Denny To released a statement and said Wong had not been arrested but had experienced an “emotional meltdown” and was under tremendous pressure.
Additional reporting: Tom Grundy.
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