Electoral Affairs Commission Chairman Barnabas Fung today inspected the training sessions and simulated activities for counting staff at the central counting station of the 2021 Legislative Council General Election.

After the inspection, Mr Fung pointed out that the preparatory work for the election is nearing completion and added that staff members would continue their work to ensure the poll and vote count on December 19 would be carried out smoothly.

The election is the largest public election after the Improving Electoral System (Consolidated Amendments) Ordinance 2021 came into effect, he said, noting that there are more than 4,470,000 registered electors.

On the polling day, about 630 polling stations will be set up and about 39,000 civil servants from different bureaus and departments will discharge electoral duties at different posts.

"When it comes to public elections, openness, fairness and honesty are the most basic principles. Accuracy and efficiency are also required, so that the election results can be announced as soon as possible. The EAC encourages all electoral staff to make their best efforts to achieve accuracy and efficiency in the conduct of the election."

Regarding new polling arrangements for staff, Mr Fung said that an initiative is in place to facilitate their early resumption of work to serve electors.

“If a polling staff member or a public officer who has to be on duty for the election during the polling hours, though not directly involved in polling, finds a long queue at his or her assigned polling station, he or she may present his or her staff identification or the approval letter issued by the relevant government department to the staff on duty there and be permitted to enter the polling station for priority queuing to collect ballot papers and carry out his or her voting."

Meanwhile, polling stations will be set up at Heung Yuen Wai, Lo Wu and Lok Ma Chau Spur Line boundary control points for eligible geographical constituency (GC) and functional constituency (FC) electors currently in the Mainland to return to Hong Kong to vote on the polling day.

After the close of polls, these three polling stations will be turned into counting stations for the counting of GC votes.

If the number of registered electors of certain GCs allocated to vote at the polling stations at Heung Yuen Wai and Lo Wu control points are less than 500, the ballot boxes concerned will be transported to the counting station at Lok Ma Chau Spur Line control point where ballot papers will be mixed with those of the respective GCs cast before counting to protect the secrecy of votes.

The ballot boxes of all FCs, on the other hand, will be delivered to the central counting station at the Hong Kong Convention & Exhibition Centre for counting.

To tie in with anti-epidemic measures, except for electors who have been assigned to the boundary control point polling stations, candidates or their agents and electoral staff, entry to or exit from the boundary control point polling stations will be prohibited and no arrangement will be made for public observation of the counting process.

The vote counting at the three aforesaid polling stations will be broadcast live on RTHK TV 32 of Radio Television Hong Kong and the website of the Information Services Department.