1 in 4 approved applicants for Hong Kong talent schemes holds foreign passport: labour chief
- Labour minister Chris Sun dismisses concerns over lack of diversity, says Hong Kong ‘attractive to foreign talent’
One in every four approved applicants under Hong Kong talent schemes holds a foreign passport, the labour chief has said, dismissing concerns over a lack of diversity.
Secretary for Labour and Welfare Chris Sun Yuk-han said on Monday over 45,000 of the more than 180,000 candidates approved for various talent schemes between the end of 2022 and last month were foreign passport holders.
“This means one out of four of the applicants across all talent schemes holds an overseas passport when they come to Hong Kong. This shows that Hong Kong is attractive to foreign talent,” Sun told lawmakers.
The minister also urged lawmakers to look past nationalities when considering the diversity of the inbound talent pool. He said the top alma mater location for young candidates under the Top Talent Pass Scheme was the United States, followed by mainland China.
Sun also addressed lawmakers’ concerns about how the government would vet applications to prevent fraudulent cases from gaining a talent visa or an extension, to stay in the city without contributing to its economy.
Edward Lau Kwok-fun of the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong (DAB) questioned whether top talent visa holders would be allowed to extend their stay or reapply for the scheme if they had failed to find a job in the city during a two-year limit.
Sun said visa holders must find a job or show proof they had been running a company. They were also required to show proof of the company’s business operations, such as taxes and staff hiring.
“If their job is completely based out of Hong Kong, unable to contribute to Hong Kong’s economic and social development, of course we will not extend their visa, no matter which sector they are in,” he added.
Angelina Kwan Yuen-yee, deputy secretary for manpower in the Labour and Welfare Bureau, said the government would not allow top talent visa holders to reapply for the scheme if they had failed to extend their stay at the end of the two years.
However, these candidates would still be eligible to settle in the city under other talent schemes.
Lawmaker and former security secretary Lai Tung-kwok also raised concerns over some middlemen services marketed on Xiaohongshu, a mainland Instagram-like social media platform, saying they offered “fraudulent” advice.
A Post search on Xiaohongshu found that some agencies claimed to offer tips on extending the top talent visa “without affecting [candidates’] jobs on the mainland”. They also advised applicants to become insurance agents in Hong Kong as a way to extend their visa in a “low cost” manner.
“We have been looking for different ways to clear the air, including claims by some middlemen that the Top Talent Pass Scheme will be cancelled. We have immediately clarified that the scheme was merely being improved,” Sun said.
DAB lawmaker Lillian Kwok Ling-lai also asked Sun how the government would verify the academic qualifications of applicants, saying relevant procedures were “unclear” to the public.
The labour minister said the administration “will severely punish” cases of sham qualifications and that he hoped relevant court cases would deter other candidates from doing so.
Last week, Wang Qingxia, fiancée of former TVB actor and singer Lee Lung-kei, was sentenced to 25 months in jail for five charges related to overstaying in the city and forging university certificates to obtain an entry permit.
Wang admitted in court that she had used three false graduation certificates, purportedly from Pacific States Aviation, in her application to the Admission Scheme for Mainland Talents and Professionals in 2019.
