"As early as in 1994 the eighth NPC considered writing into laws that officials register their family possessions with the government, but no follow-up measures were taken. When the Civil Servant Law entered effect in 2006, it had no single article about government employees' family property," recalled Mr. Han. "In recent years the amount of money involved in corruption cases has been soaring, the culprits occupy high positions, causing loud repercussions across the nation. I hope the NPC can address this legislation at its earliest opportunity."

Han first raised the issue in 2006. Later he received a response from the NPC Commission for Internal and Judicial Affairs, saying the situation was not ripe for such a law, and more details needed to be studied and discussed.

He reopened the issue in 2007, and got a written reply from the Ministry of Supervision, which specified the missing links that had to be filled before a law could be shaped. It also informed him that the ministry was discussing the possibilities of a decree demanding government workers to declare their incomes.

Han Deyun was content with the explanation, but wouldn't give up until seeing substantive results from his efforts. In 2008 and 2009 he brought the proposal back to the NPC. In 2008 Altay City in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region launched the nation's first officials' property declaration experiment. Han followed it closely, and wrote a lengthy report to the NPC in 2009, expounding on his idea of escalating the Altay practice into a national law. In the paper he incorporated other legal scholars' views, made an analysis of similar systems in other nations and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and anticipated draft clauses for the suggested law.

"For this year's NPC session I modified the report from last year and added the latest results of my research and thinking on the trial in Chongqing (starting this year, the city required senior officials in local judicial administrations to report their property). I hope the legislature can finally deliver legislation on that. As I believe for a reform like this, a top-to-bottom pattern can better secure the desired outcomes."

Privacy and Transparency

"I voted against it," Liang Huixing said frankly. "Judicial corruption has come to the point of crushing public tolerance, but the Supreme Court made light of this in its report to the NPC last year. In comparison the report by the Supreme People's Procuratorate is more straightforward and assuring," is how the 65-year-old member of the NPC Legal Affairs Commission explained his dissent over the work report by the Supreme Court.

"The Supreme Procuratorate revealed that 13,000 officials were convicted of taking a bribe that year, including 2,620 from judicial departments – one-third of them being judges. I think the Supreme Court is obliged to make some explanation or clarification, but in its report it skirted around the problem with such obscure expressions as "a few judges…some judges…. It is just a word game," Liang concluded.