Chief Secretary Rafael Hui Si-yan stood in the main chamber of the Legislative Council and announced the abandonment of the invitation for proposals.

Under his leadership, he said, a consultative committee would decide the way forward. This set the stage for the West Kowloon project to start from scratch.

But while legislative councillors applauded the government for backing down, they continued to grill the administration on Hong Kong's cultural policy: what and where is it?

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At Hui's side, Secretary for Home Affairs Patrick Ho Chi-ping failed to come up with a coherent answer that morning, but six weeks later, Ho returned to Legco. In his hand was a new document titled, conveniently, Hong Kong's Cultural Policy.

The government hoped that this would satisfy critics who argued it was putting the cart before the horse in its approach to West Kowloon. Why create "cultural hardware" when "cultural software" is unclear, they asked.

Despite having a concrete cultural policy that government officials can now refer to when asked, its content has not impressed anyone.

Rather, the cultural policy has been described by critics, as "outdated" and "dangerous."

Stephen Chan Ching-kiu, the director of Lingnan University's master of cultural studies program, said the policy is not wrong but outdated.

He zeroed in on the policy's first page which broke down culture into three categories: everyday life culture, high culture and spiritual culture.

At the bottom, the paper said, "the government can and should exercise influence through its policy primarily on high culture."

High culture, the top-down flow of culture that started with royalty dictating arts and culture, is not conducive to modern Hong Kong, he said.

"High art in that sense is a very traditional sense. So right now if we can accept some expensive Picasso and put it in IFC, it would be a display of power and wealth," he said.

"[But] we also have to imagine that communities should have the right and opportunity to bring their everyday life, their everyday talents, into their neighborhood and whatever is considered to be the pools of cultural creativity."

A spokeswoman for the Home Affairs Department, said the policy was in line with the "core values of Hong Kong as a free, diversified and open society."

She said the document is a descriptive policy rather than a prescriptive one to ensure artistic freedom of expression.

"As a facilitator, the government will neither impose an official definition on culture and the arts, nor influence the specific operation of artistic creation or contents of creativity. Instead, we are committed to upholding the freedom of cultural and artistic creation and expression, as well as providing an environment that keenly supports the development of culture and the arts.

" To ensure the diversified and balanced development of culture and the arts in Hong Kong, the government provides support to both high culture art forms and avant garde art forms."

Chan is quick to point out the government's claim to having a descriptive policy conflicts with its line about exercising influence through high culture. But according to one local artist, the mere existence of a cultural policy is "dangerous."

Multimedia artist Jeffrey du Vallier d'Aragon Aranita said any cultural policy can threaten the freedom of an artist, even ones which claim to be "descriptive not prescriptive."

Aranita works around the world but regards Hong Kong as his base, and is the deputy museum director of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Beijing.

Unlike Chan who wants a more specific cultural policy, Aranita said any government policy could interfere with artistic expression exactly what the government said it is trying to prevent.

"I think artists should starve and die," he joked. "[To clarify], if there's something that can be done to help the career of artists, it is that people should simply buy the work of art that speaks to them."

Even as an artist, Aranita does not believe government subsidies for working or aspiring artists are a good idea. Instead, he believes in nonfinancial aid to nurture local artists and help them with production.

"Take the resources you already have. Artists need carpentry services; they need welding; they need storage space. Facilitate that. The government should create some sort of body to enable that," Aranita said.

Given high real estate prices and professional crafting services, the government can and should help local artists with the means to realize, store, sell and ship museum quality work, he said.

"These artists should of course pay compensation for the use of these services and facilities if they make any money," Aranita said. "This kind of thing can be set up immediately."

Both Aranita and Chan agree that local arts education must be strengthened. To satisfy the demand for West Kowloon, there must be better appreciation of the arts and culture from a young age. In short, give the people the tools to appreciate the arts here in Hong Kong.

That will be the start of a healthier society.

"Art needs an audience and the artist who doesn't understand this, or is not in a position to receive feedback through exhibition reviews and sales, can't really develop fully," Aranita said. "Whether good or bad reviews, or making sales or not, however, artists must struggle on their own to clarify and to refine their own artistic points of view.

"We become all the richer as a society - or, perhaps I should say, as a species - when this occurs."