How can we make sense of what is happening today if we don’t have the context of yesterday? And that includes having access to official files and records of the past. But unlike most advanced societies, including China, Hong Kong currently suffers from the lack of an Archives Law, stipulating how records should be kept, preserved and made available to the public. As a consequence, and particularly since the Handover, many official records — meeting notes, transcripts — have been lost, or perhaps deliberately destroyed.

To tackle this problem, the Law Reform Commission has come up with a report looking at both the need for an archives law and legislation guaranteeing public access to information. Some journalists, historians and archivists think the proposals are too weak. But there is still time for the public to respond.