Hong Kong authorities are set to tighten controls on employers seeking to import labour following complaints of local employees being replaced under the scheme, with such measures to be proposed in the city leader’s policy address, the Post has learned.

Government sources said that authorities would roll out more public works projects to increase jobs in the construction sector, an area hit hard by a significant drop in private developments.

With the unemployment rate climbing between May and July to a near three-year high of 3.7 per cent, or 145,000 people jobless, all eyes are on how Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu will address the situation in his annual policy blueprint on Wednesday.

Insiders said that some of Lee’s proposals would look at the city’s labour import scheme, which was expanded in 2023 and led to a substantial increase in the number of foreign workers from fewer than 3,000 to more than 50,000 by the end of May this year.

More stringent measures would be introduced for employers applying to the scheme, including adjusting the mechanism of the required non-local to local manpower ratio, which currently stands at 1:2.

“We have ruled out the option of halting labour imports, or else Hong Kong will not have enough manpower for jobs,” one insider said.