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Mr. Chairman, may I ask if the Commissioner would be very careful on this point for the sake of the officers themselves, because the hawkers are asking why this huge shop which is obstructing a great number of things is being allowed to stand, while little hawkers' stalls are being demolished.
COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT: Certainly, Mr. Chairman, I will be giving instructions to staff to exercise their new powers.
At the moment they can do nothing but attempt to persuade, and any exercise of powers that takes place still requires the presence of police to assist. As regards the presence of a large shop that is an encroachment on the pavement outside a shop on the ground floor of a domestic block, the explanation why that is there is because the Resettlement Policy Select Committee put a ban on the removal of such obstructions in front of restaurants until a new policy was arrived at. Where we cannot move obstructions in front of restaurants, I feel that it would also be inappropriate to move them from the front of other shops.
MRS. ELLIOTT: Mr. Chairman, may I ask the Commissioner if he is not mistaken in what I meant. This has nothing to do with a shop, but a shop which is supposed to be a hawker stall right in the middle of the hawker bazaar, and it has developed into a shop. It has no connection with any ground floor shop.
COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT: If Mrs. ELLIOTT can give me further particulars of the location of this I will certainly be glad to look into it. It sounds very like one of these things that seems to happen in hawker bazaars everywhere. Whatever the Urban Services may do about ballotting for stalls, when our stalls in Resettlement Estates are ballotted for somehow or other the adjacent stalls seem to coalesce and turn into one shop. Theoretically three stalls, possibly three theoretical licences and three theoretical stallholders, and then they expand and occupy the whole row, and there is nothing which can be easily done to correct that, I think.
MRS. ELLIOTT: Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask if the Commissioner could send a senior officer to inspect the situation at Sau Mau Ping, because there is a great deal of discontent amongst the hawkers, some of whom are genuine hawkers. They were told to move to a certain place and have now had their stalls demolished. I am not making any special complaint against this big shop, but the hawkers are naturally asking why this tin shop, with a tin roof, is left while their hawkers' stalls with canvas roofs are being demolished.
COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT: There are three parts to that question. First of all the operation on the 26th could not be completed because there wasn't time. The officers concerned both from my department and from the Police, had to go away and do other things - in fact they had to collect their pay, it was pay day. That may account for some stalls being left and not dealt with whereas others were. Secondly the Assistant Commissioner in charge of estates is looking into the situation at Sau Mau Ping and Kam Tin during this week.
Thirdly, I could wish that there was a little less sympathy for hawkers and a lot more concern for the convenience of the rest of the public who constitute the majority.
MRS. ELLIOTT: Mr. Chairman, may I ask if Mr. BARTY thinks I have too much sympathy for hawkers? My sympathy is more with hawkers than the people who build large shops and are allowed to keep them there. I am sympathizing with the residents for having to put up with these huge structures while the genuine hawkers seem to be moved.
COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT: Yes, I quite agree with that. I was sympathizing with the residents who cannot get through the passageways of the hawkers bazaars because illegal hawkers are obstructing them.
(17) MRS. E. ELLIOTT asked the following question:
(a) Is the Urban Services Department doing anything to improve the sanitary condition of the squatters in the recently flooded area of Aberdeen? This area is behind the breakwater, Tsung Mai.
(b) How far away is the nearest water supply? What kind of toilet accommodation is provided?
(c) When are the residents likely to be resettled?
THE COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT replied as follows:
The answer to the first part of the question is that immediate action was taken by the Urban Services Department and the Marine Department after the June rainstorms to remove all debris, both on the land and on the water. Normally only one scavenging labourer is on permanent duty to keep the bank south of the Aberdeen Main Road as clean as possible.
The answer to the second part of the question is that there are 3 stand-pipes each with 2 taps in this area between the Aberdeen Main Road and the Creek. 8 temporary latrines have been provided.
In reply to the third part of the question, 390 people from this area have already been resettled. Another 8,300 will
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