LAND AND HOUSING
135
low-cost housing estates. Rents and other conditions of tenancy are the same as those for other members of the public. In 1952 a scheme was started to encourage local civil servants on the pension- able establishment to form co-operative building societies through which they could receive loans from the government to buy land and build flats. Under this scheme 205 societies with 4,101 members have received loans. Of these, 190 societies with 3,769 members have completed their buildings. The government has now reviewed the scheme. Further loans will be made to 60 groups which have already applied, but thereafter a new scheme will be introduced. Under this, the development of sites and the construction of multi- storey blocks of flats will be carried out by the government itself, thus ensuring the most economical and practical use of the funds available. Funds for the new scheme will become available in April 1966.-Ten per cent of these funds will be reserved for building co-operatives organized on existing lines by groups of senior officers. The government also provides accommodation for its overseas staff and for many of its local staff, including police and fire service officers, nurses and resident staff on government installations.
In June 1965, an advisory Housing Board was appointed. The board;-under the chairmanship of Mr K. A. Watson, an unofficial member of the Legislative Council, has a membership of four other unofficial members with housing or sociological experience and six official members concerned with housing matters. The board, which has a three-year term of office, is required to keep under review, and to report annually, progress in all types of housing construction; to assess present and future housing needs, not excluding ancillary social and employment facilities and the balance between types of housing; and to advise on co-ordination in execut- ing housing policies.
RENT CONTROL
Rent control, instituted by proclamation immediately after the war, was embodied in the Landlord and Tenant Ordinance in 1947. This restricted rent by reference to pre-war figures and at the same time freed new and substantially reconstructed buildings from control. Thus, the broad distinction between controlled and uncon- trolled premises lies in whether they are pre-war or post-war build- ings. The 1947 ordinance allowed increases beyond standard rent