HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 15 February 1989
香港立法局—————- 一九八九年二月十五日
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MR. EDWARD HO: Sir, in view of the acute shortage of supply of office space against demand, would the Government inform this Council what methodology is used to assess land supply for office use and whether it is an effective one?
SECRETARY FOR LANDS AND WORKS: Sir, I am not quite sure whether in fact Mr. HO probably did not mean demand, but I shall take it that he meant actually supply as he said. As far as supply is concerned, the Government is in a reasonably strong position in that it has records of building plans, records of land sales and so on and can make reasonably good forecasts. There are some points at which there is a certain amount of doubt because in some cases it may not be totally clear for forecasting three or years ahead what form a building will take and what the division between, for instance, commercial and residential will be. But on the whole I see nothing wrong with the system of estimating supply.
MR. CHEONG: Sir, could the Secretary advise whether, in the light of the changing circumstances of the nature of manufacturing businesses in Hong Kong, the Government should consider an automatic uplift of 50% of the factory space, though not, as Mr. McGREGOR suggested, unrelated to industrial use?
SECRETARY FOR LANDS AND WORKS: Sir, I can only say that the view taken by the Town Planning Board, to which I subscribe, is that the procedures for dealing with applications for office accommodation greater than 30% are sufficiently sympathetic and relevant to a situation so that anybody who really needs it for the purposes of supporting manufacture can in fact get it.
林貝聿嘉議員問:主席先生,如租金再繼續上升,很多跨國公司會考慮遷離香港。政府可否告知 本局,當這情況出現時,有什麼預防措施?政府會否考慮恢復租金管制?
SECRETARY FOR LANDS AND WORKS: I think, Sir, that we are most unlikely to have rent control in the commercial sector. I have not actually heard of this happening in other countries and I do not think we have ever done it in Hong Kong. I do not foresee any very extreme precautionary measures. I think perhaps in making my original reply to the original question, I may have boasted too little what I said was that I thought the Government could take little action. But the market is taking action. It is taking action through actually applying for more office buildings, and for seeking to hasten the production of