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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
MRS. E. ELLIOTT, CHAIRMAN OF THE LIBRARY SELECT COMMITTEE, replied as follows:
Mr. Chairman, the answer to the first part is in the affirmative. In the library expansion programme of this Council, a public library of 12,000 sq. ft., with a basic book-stock of 26,000 volumes is planned in the Ping Shek Housing Estate. This proposed library is intended to serve Ngau Tau Kok, Kai Tak and Kwun Tong.
The proposition was first made by the Library Select Committee in January, 1965. Government has approved in principle the establishment of this library, and a site has been reserved in the Ping Shek Estate by the Housing Authority. It is anticipated that this Estate will be completed in mid-summer 1970 and the library should be ready for public service six months thereafter. The answer to the second part of the question is, therefore, early 1971.
(16) MR. HENRY WONG asked the following question:
I understand that there are a number of schools involved in the King's Park Cottage Area clearance. Can this Council be informed of what kind of resettlement is going to be given to them?
THE COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT replied as follows:-
Sir, there are four schools involved in the clearance of King's Park Cottage Area which, under existing policy, are not eligible for resettlement accommodation.
Representations have been received from these schools and the matter is being examined at present by the Resettlement Policy Select Committee.
MR. WONG:--Mr. Chairman, considering their hardship and livelihood, is the Resettlement Department going to recommend to the Policy Committee that they should be given resettlement accommodation on a slide rule basis?
COMMISSIONER FOR RESETTLEMENT:--Sir, as I said before, this matter is under consideration by the Committee, and I think that we must leave it to the Committee to make its recommendation on the matter.
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MR. C. K. CHAN:--Perhaps the chairman of the Resettlement Policy Select Committee can say something on this aspect?
MR. BERNACCHI:-I agree entirely with the Commissioner that the matter is under consideration.
MOTION.
MR. B. A. BERNACCHI moved the following Motion:
"The Council appreciates the need for hawkers of fresh meat in Hong Kong and remits this matter to the Hawker Policy Select Committee for it to work out the practical details."
He said: Mr. Chairman, I am proposing this Motion because in my opinion we have to look realities in the face. There are not enough market, the mini-markets programme is only just beginning and certainly will not become effective for years. Are we therefore going to close our eyes to the fact that hawkers quite illegally are selling meat, mostly from respectable stalls, mostly in legal or illegal hawker bazaars. Apart from the fact that we, the Urban Council through the Urban Services Department, have just not sufficient staff to stop this type of hawking on the ground, the hawking is necessary to meet the public demands. This Motion is designed, not to rush the Urban Council into issuing hawker licences for the sale of fresh meat, the sale of which I am the first to admit can be dangerous to life if it is bad, but to acknowledge that there is a need for something to be done about licences, and refer the matter to the Hawker Policy Select Committee to discuss the ways and means of implementing it. It is no use for Urban Councillors to stick their heads in the sand like an ostrich and not do anything, and it is far too late to crack down on all these illegal hawkers of fresh meat and, even if it is possible, the net result would be a shortage in the supply position of meat in Hong Kong. One of the ways that I contemplate this Motion could be implemented eventually is by turning the present illegal meat hawker bazaars in resettlement areas into mini-markets with the smallest possible amount of red tape. After all, it has been done in two resettlement estates in the way of creating temporary markets for the sale of live chickens, which are potentially almost as great a danger to health as the sale of fresh meat, if done in bad conditions or bad surroundings. Of course, on the ground, the meat obtainable from an illegal meat stall is usually of a high quality. If it were not, the public health in Hong Kong would have deteriorated long before today. Therefore, I appeal to members not to be ostrich-like, but to refer this principle to the Hawker Policy Select Committee for implementation so that we can once again return to a Hong Kong in which hawkers
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