IMPROVING WORKING PRACTICES

In an exhibition at Xibaipo about its revolutionary past, there is a display of six restrictions the CPC imposed on officials 65 years ago: do not celebrate one's birthday; do not give gifts; fewer toasts at dinners; less clapping at meetings; do not name a place after a person; do not honor a CPC official in the same way as prominent communist leaders such as Karl Marx and Vladimir Lenin.

In his visit last July, Xi stood in front of the board and crosschecked the rules with what the Party does today. His conclusion was that not all rules are fully observed.

The CPC has always believed the behavior of its members, officials in particular, plays a serious part in its rule. The current CPC leaders introduced an eight point rule a month after they were elected in November 2012 as the first battle in the war against corruption and bureaucracy.

The rule tells CPC officials to adopt a no-nonsense approach without ceremony and with less visits and meetings.

The rule may have its origins back in the early 1980s, when Xi was party chief of Zhengding County in Hebei. Locals still recall how Xi reacted to officialdom when he was a county official.

In the summer of 1983, Xi's jeep got stuck in the mire on a rural road. When they noticed that the passengers were officials, villagers refused to lend a hand and swore at them. Xi stopped one of the officials from berating the villagers and told them to reflect on why villagers might react this way.

The incident was a prelude to a regulation requiring officials to reject bureaucracy, take the lead in eschewing unhealthy practices, cut meetings and receptions; and value work efficiency.

Cheng Baohuai, a retired official from Zhengding, said the eight point rule "reflects the same revolutionary tradition" as the Zhengding regulation of 30 years ago.

The eight point rule preceded the mass-line campaign. Reflecting on their work and correcting bad practices are main contents of criticism and self-criticism sessions for Party officials during the campaign.

Over the past year, Party discipline has repeatedly barred officials from giving and receiving gifts bought with public money, and stopped them from going to fancy dinners during festivals and holidays. Xi has taken the lead in these measures. There are no traffic controls nor closure of public places during Xi's domestic inspection tours.

Since 2013, the number of official meetings, documents and news reporting for the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee were reduced. The efficiency of administrative approval has been raised. Spending on receptions, overseas trips, and vehicles have been reduced. Festival exhibitions were cut by more than a half. In 2013, more than 30,000 Chinese officials were punished for violating the eight point rule.

During his visits to Hebei for the mass-line campaign, Xi told the officials to treat themselves as ordinary Party members in implementing the rules. All people are equal in enforcing work style regulations, Xi told them.

Locals felt the changes. Chen Sumei runs a restaurant at Xibaipo, now a famous tourist site. A large number of visitors here are Party and government officials from across the country.

She told Xinhua that fewer and fewer of her customers paid for their dinners with public money. "More and more customers pay out of their own pockets, so they prefer less expensive dishes," she said.