clearance and resettlement, planned some months ahead, which is aimed at freeing land for permanent development, and the resettlement of fire victims, which must of necessity be regarded as of secondary importance, can only be introduced into the programme as circumstances permit. 108. In the meantime their immediate needs are met by the officers of the Social Welfare Department. They are registered and given free meals at emergency feeding centres, and in the cold winter months, which is unfortunately the season when fires are most likely to occur, they are also given clothing and blankets donated by voluntary agencies.
109. Whenever possible they are allowed to rebuild their huts on the fire site, though in such cases advantage is taken of the opportunity to form new fire lanes, the huts so displaced being re-sited elsewhere in the vicinity. When the fire site is likely to be required for permanent development in the near future, or when it is an encroachment on land held on lease from the Crown, the fire-victims are offered alternative sites, either on suitable Crown land or, as a last resort, in the streets. In each case individual sites are allocated by Area Officers of the Squatter Control Division who also supervise the rebuilding and encourage the squatters as far as possible to use fire-proof materials.
110. The exceptionally heavy rains in June 1959 also caused con- siderable damage in the squatter areas. 409 squatter huts housing 3,311 persons were destroyed by floods, by landslides or by falling boulders. and were resited; in most cases the original site was too dangerous to be used and new sites were found and allocated,
111. There was also considerable damage to the older tenements both from fire and from the heavy rains, and 1,393 tenement residents whose houses were destroyed or condemned as dangerous were allocated sites for temporary huts by the department during the year. As most tenements are in the more crowded urban districts where it is not possible to find suitable vacant land, the families affected can only be offered sites in selected re-site areas, which are usually outside the urban areas and may be some distance from where they lived before.
112. Rooftop squatters whose parent tenement is destroyed or demolished for development are also given sites in the department's resite areas, a total of 1,168 squatters being resited in this way during the year. Where a tenement is to be re-developed the ordinary tenants, as distinct from the rooftop squatters, receive compensation under the Landlord and Tenant Ordinance and, consequently, they are not offered accommodation by the department.
40
:
: