149
163. A Commission was appointed in 1923 to inquire as to what measures are possible to increase the quantity and decrease the cost of housing accommodation in the Colony."* While certain recommendations of the Commission, such as the improvement and extension of communications, are largely out-of-date with the development of roads and motor transport, it is of interest to note that reference was made to the transfer of military lands and it was recommended that the removal of of the military from the central and already levelled and drained sites in the heart of the City of Victoria and of the Kowloon Peninsula should be expedited. The Commission declared that these sites, which occupy some hundreds of acres, are vital to the residential and commercial expansion of the Colony. The areas in question are still occupied by the military, that in the heart of Kowloon Peninsula as mule lines.
164. The Commission while of the opinion that it was impracticable to do away with middle-men in the building of houses recommended that the re-letting of a whole contract should be forbidden by law, as the practice tended to increase the cost of buildings. The failure to enforce a clause in Public Works contracts forbidding sub- letting has already been commented on. The Commission also observed that the existing labour guilds sought to debar new-comers from the country by large entrance fees. The practice of demanding large entrance fees appears to have been common among guilds and unions about this time as the author of "Some Aspects of the Labour Situation in Canton ", who investigated in 1926, reports that the Coffin Makers Union required of each member the payment of seventy dollars as an initiation fee.
165. The Commission recommended in the interest of all branches of trade in. the Colony that a law should be passed "for the reference to a strong and independent tribunal, with one representative of the employers and one representative of the workmen as assessors, of all disputes in this Colony relating to wages to be paid to workmen, hours of employment and holidays. Such a law is clearly desirable in the interests of workmen, no less than in those of employers, for it is of the utmost importance to the former to know that they have a definite tribunal to which they can appeal with the full certainty of their grievances being gone into without delay and without any cessation of wages such as is involved in a strike."
166. Among other recommendations the Commission proposed the building of houses for the accommodation at a reasonable rent of Government servants of all races and grades.
167. No effect appears to have been given to these recommendations.
168. A further step in the direction of town planning was taken in the appoint- ment of the Playing Fields Committee,† which made certain recommendations, not only for playing fields but for "lungs" and open spaces.
169. In 1935 a Housing Commission was appointed "to inquire into the housing difficulties in Victoria and Kowloon with special reference to overcrowding and its effect on tuberculosis and suggest steps which should be taken to remedy existing conditions.'
170. In Appendix 2 to the Report,¶ which was issued in 1938, it is pointed out from figures contained in the census of 1931, when the population was only about 850,000, that in Hong Kong there were some 270 acres populated at an average density of over one thousand per acre, with a minimum of eight hundred per acre and a maximum of over one thousand seven hundred per acre in parts. This density has no doubt increased with the recent influx of refugees.
171. The old-fashioned, but still the most common type, of Chinese tenement house is of three or four storeys, often with a shop on the ground floor. The length is about 43′ 6" and the breadth, which is determined by the length of the China fir pole, about 13′ 6′′. The height of the flats might be 13′ but this is frequently utilised
* Sessional Paper No. 10 of 1923.
+ Sessional Paper No. 2 of 1930.
1 Sessional Paper No. 12 of 1938.