Hong Kong’s lawmakers don’t need to be coddled

Eighty per cent of success is showing up, as they say. So, all but one of Hong Kong’s 89 legislators joining a week-long “national affairs study visit” to Beijing made a good impression.Lawmaker Stanley Ng Chau-pei called it a “groundbreaking opportunity” for legislators to study and deepen their understanding of national conditions. Showing up eager to learn and to better grasp how Hong Kong can play a more proactive role in national development is indeed commendable.The legislature had worked overtime to review the bill for the Huanggang Port and legislators committed their first week of summer recess to the study tour. It’s interesting that the delegation was referred to in one news report as “a class”. The group photos, complete with a banner in the front, resemble those of schoolchildren on summer study tours.