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HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
Geotechnical problems covering the stability of slopes on a number of sites and the amount of financial and technical resources required for slope stabilization works adversely affected the smooth progress and cost of a number of Urban Council projects. These include the Ko Shan Road Recreation Ground which will provide an open-air theatre, 4 tennis courts, 1 mini-soccer pitch, a children's playground and a rest garden with water feature; a park at Chung Hau Street in Hung Hom; a rest garden in Po Kong Road in Tsz Wan Shan and a number of small sitting-out areas located in densely populated districts in the urban areas. Responsibility for the substantial extra cost involved in slope stabilization at all these sites is still the subject of discussion between Government and the Council.
Close liaison and good operation are maintained with the Architectural Office and the Crown Lands and Survey Office who are both represented on my Committee and I would like to acknowledge their valuable contribution to its work. I would also like to thank the staff of the Planning and Development Division of the Urban Services Department who continue to provide the essential planning services to implement the decisions of the Committee. Last year I mentioned they had moved to new quarters. They have moved again. This time I hope for a lengthy period as there is nothing more disruptive to the work of planning than frequent shifts. It smacks of bad planning?!!
Turning to public housing, two important milestones have been passed—most important, more than two million people now live in public housing accommodation of one kind or another; less important, but significant nonetheless, this is the Jubilee Year of public housing which means that all this has been done in just 25 years.
The number of housing estates has climbed into the 90s and new scope will have been added to the public housing programme with the opening of the first Home Ownership flats for thrifty yet not well-to-do families who thanks to the Home Ownership Scheme will achieve the dream of owning their own home.
Much has been made of the reduction in the public housing programme, resulting from the Financial Secretary's curbs on public works, as announced in his Budget Speech, yet even now few people seem to understand the correct position.
Output for the financial year ending on March 31 will be an estimated 35,000 flats which is about two and a half times more than the Housing Authority's previous record production.
Furthermore this rate of 35,000 flats a year is to be maintained well into the 80s.
The cut in fact was a reduction in the planned output of housing, and as chairman of the Authority's Building Committee I am in a position to inform you that the construction industry was so overheated, and tender prices shooting up so alarmingly, that there was no other choice but to curb our original ambitious construction programme. The number of flats completed is what counts.
HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL
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A significant and alarming new feature for us all to ponder is the Secretary for Housing's recent warning that about a quarter of a million people have entered Hong Kong since January 1978. Most of them will bring relatives from China, or marry here and create new families in Hong Kong, so that by the middle or late 1980s we will have probably at least half a million people more to house. This is a new dimension to be added to an already daunting task which no other place has faced up to as realistically, or effectively as Hong Kong.
Turning to the subject of environmental protection, I would once more like to bring the Council up to date in respect of the activities of EPCOM over the last 12 months.
Members may recall that in 1978 the Environmental Protection Unit was formed within Environment Branch and that this led to EPCOM undergoing a major structural change, with the full committee meeting on those occasions when there were matters of particular importance to be discussed, and the regular month to month work of EPCOM being carried on by a Central Co-ordinating Committee (CCC).
The CCC, of which I was a member, met on seven occasions between January and July 1979 under the Chairmanship of the Secretary for the Environment. Issues related to the two power station projects continued to dominate the agenda, and discussions on this subject dealt with various Environmental Impact Reports relating to the Castle Peak 'A' Power Station and the Hongkong Electric Co. Ltd. Lamma Generating Station.
Apart from these environmental impact reports, there were also papers on the control of noise from air-conditioning and ventilating systems, and, last but certainly not least, the Waste Disposal Bill 1979, which was the first of the five environmental protection ordinances to be completed on which of course this Council was consulted.
EPCOM members also decided that the concept of a smaller Committee, under the chairmanship of the Secretary for the Environment, with provision for sub-committees, had been successful and should be retained for the future. A reconstituted EPCOM met for the first time in September, and has met monthly since then. It discussed a wide range of subjects including Stream Pollution in the New Territories, the Water Pollution Control Bill 1979, and the Disposal of Pulverized Fly-Ash (PFA) from power stations. This could be a major environmental problem as these two new stations when operating on coal at full blast will produce over one million tons for disposal.
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