1
7
Government should pay to acquire private lands. In
practice, the market price of recently issued Letters B
has, at one time, risen as high as $25 per square foot,
but has recently fallen back to around $17 per square
foot, presumably because of the exceptionally large amounts
of new entitlements issued in 1977 and the uncertainty as
to when land within urban development areas could be
made available for exchange.
2.6
There is presently no method of continuous or
periodic up-dating of the compensation rate. For this
reason, there has been no serious interest in accepting
cash compensation, until recently, when the price of new
Letter B fell back to the 1976 level.
Procedural Problems
2.7
Section 3 of the Crown Lands Resumption
Ordinance (Chapter 124) provides for the Governor-in-
Council to decide whether a proposed resumption is for
a public purpose. Section 4(2) of the Town Planning
Ordinance (Chapter 131) provides that the Governor-in-
Council may decide that resumption of lots for the
implementation of an approved statutory plan is for a
public purpose in the terms of Chapter 124. Procedurally,
the way in which the resumption of land in the New
Territories urban areas would best be justified is in
terms of implementation of a statutorily approved
/plan.