Chief Executive John Lee has sought to allay dissatisfaction with the government's plans to import workers, saying officials have the interests of the community in mind and will protect local people.

At his weekly media briefing on Tuesday, Lee was asked about a walk-out by labour representatives of the Labour Advisory Board from a meeting on Monday to discuss the plans, which include importing 20,000 transport and construction workers and temporarily allowing outsiders to fill 26 types of jobs such as salespersons and clerks.

The CE said he understands the stance of the labour representatives, but the moves are needed to ease a manpower crunch Hong Kong is experiencing.

"We must ensure that we have sufficient labour in Hong Kong so that we can operate well and our service quality will not fall. All in all, we hope that our economy can benefit as a result of our various measures and we can continue to grow. We will make a bigger pie to ensure that there is vibrancy in our economy. That is important to all sectors, even to our local labour force," Lee said.

"I hope you can understand that we have the overall interests of Hong Kong in mind, and we will safeguard the interests of local workers."

Meanwhile, Lam Wai-kong, a labour representative on the Labour Advisory Board, called on authorities to provide data to prove that there are manpower crunches in the 26 extra types of jobs which outsiders can now fill.

"These are relatively low-skill and frontline jobs. As far as the unions understand, they don't have labour shortages," he said.

"If the government has relevant data and consults the labour sector and unions, we are not against importing workers for sectors that have manpower shortages."

Lam said authorities should also design a mechanism to suspend the policies if and when the interests of local workers are harmed.