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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
MR. HU:-Thank you Mr. Chairman for the attention you have taken with this matter.
(At the suggestion of the Chairman, a brief recess was held at this point)
MOTIONS.
(1) MR. CHEUNG WING-IN moved the following motion:-
This Council recommends that Government put Tsuen Wan under the jurisdiction of this Council in view of the fact that Tsuen Wan has for all practical purposes already become an extension of urban Kowloon.
He said:-Mr. Chairman, while the growth of Hong Kong Island and urban Kowloon after the war has been spectacular, the growth of Tsuen Wan in the last 15 years has been even more spectacular. From an outlying rural community with its ancient methods of tillage and husbandry it has grown into a modern industrial city providing a wide range of industries using machines that are among the most up-to-date in the world. Along with a complete change in economy came an almost entirely new population. Most of them are from different parts of China; others are new comers from urban Kowloon who have moved there with the factories or have come there to live for want of living accommodation in Kowloon. The indigenous population that remains forms but a minority of the present population.
To cope with the very rapid growth Government has introduced certain piecemeal changes and stop-gap measures in the administration which have produced a number of anomalies. It is with the object of removing these anomalies and for the betterment of Tsuen Wan people that I have brought this motion before Council to-day.
On account of the magnitude of the problem in Tsuen Wan which is only 20 minutes by car from the Star Ferry the control of squatters there has been transferred from the New Territories Administration to the Resettlement Department whilst elsewhere in the New Territories, the New Territories Administration remains responsible. To provide housing for the large number of factory workers huge resettlement blocks have been erected in Tai Wo Hau and Kwai Chung accommodating over 80,000 people. The anomaly is the Resettlement Department operates under the authority of the Urban Council in the urban areas of Hong Kong and Kowloon but not in the New Territories. At the same time the Housing Authority which is in fact the Urban Council under a different name has in Tsuen Wan erected the Fuk Loi Estate housing over 18,000 people and another scheme housing 32,000 people also in Tsuen Wan is in the planning stage. The Urban Council
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through its members serving on the Housing Authority has jurisdiction over the Housing Authority Estates but not over the Resettlement Estates in Tsuen Wan. The resettlement programme with its multiple problems has provided a constant challenge to Urban Councillors.
Because of lack of jurisdiction in Tsuen Wan no Councillor is able to bring pressure on the right quarters to improve conditions in the Resettlement Estates in Tsuen Wan. I feel it is time for Government's entire resettlement programme, both in the urban areas and in Tsuen Wan to be co-ordinated under the Urban Council.
A similar anomaly exists in the relation between the Urban Council and the Urban Services Department. By constitution the Urban Services Department is the executive arm of the Urban Council which lays down the policy and controls the operations of the Department. Since April 1960 the Urban Services Department has by subsequent amendment of the law been made responsible in Tsuen Wan and other parts of the New Territories for public cleansing, the supervision and cleansing of markets and hawker areas and the control of public bath house, cemeteries, burials, public parks, playgrounds and beaches. But on the other hand the territorial jurisdiction of the Urban Council has not been similarly extended. This gives rise to the anomaly that the Department which operates under the authority of the Urban Council has assumed wider territorial responsibility than the Council itself.
These anomalies have resulted in fragmentation of authority which hampers progress and results in the public amenities in Tsuen Wan not developing on the same level as the urban areas for the benefit of the people. A glaring example of the absurdity of the present state of affairs can be found in the function of the Library Select Committee of the Urban Council. Before long this Select Committee will have to do something about the need for a library in Tsuen Wan but on account of the limited jurisdiction of the Urban Council it will find itself unable to operate a library service there. I am sure this is not the true intent of Government when it charged the Library Select Committee with the responsibility to set up and operate branch libraries in various parts of the Colony.
The people of Tsuen Wan have every right to demand public health services and amenities of the same standard as are provided in urban Kowloon. There are many Urban Council voters in Tsuen Wan and as one of their elected representatives on this Council I urge that in their interests the Urban Council be permitted to assume jurisdiction over the modern township of Tsuen Wan including the new reclamation of Kwai Chung and the island of Tsing Yi.
If Government accepts the recommendations of the Working Party on Franchise and I can see no reason why it would not, it is possible that many thousand more Tsuen Wan residents will become voters at
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