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more GDT squads.' Of course, in other areas, if the situation is as bad or worse than Chai Wan, it will be hard to consider worse and then more GDT squads must be somehow or other provided for.
7. MR. DICKSON K. F. PANG asked the following question (in English):--
(a) Has there been any liaison or discussion between Urban Council and Hong Kong Housing Authority to consider resiting hawkers in the streets into the new markets within public housing estates? If no, will this Council consider to discuss this with Hong Kong Housing Authority?
(b) Is there any liaison or co-operation between Urban Services Department and Housing Department for controlling the problem of illegal hawkers in the streets near or within public housing estates?
MR. HILTON CHEONG-LEEN, CHAIRMAN OF THE MARKETS AND STREET TRADERS SELECT COMMITTEE, replied as follows (in English):-The first part of the question concerns the Council's liaison with the Housing Authority to explore the possibility of resiting street hawkers into public housing estate markets.
In 1986 the Working Party to Review Hawker and Related Policies discussed with the Housing Department the resiting of street hawkers into existing or new public housing estate markets. The view taken by the Housing Department was that market stalls in public housing estates could not be set aside for use by the Urban Council for hawker resiting, but that hawkers from outside the estates could participate in open tender exercises for the Housing Authority's market stalls. The Urban Services Department holds regular liaison meetings with the Housing Department to discuss various matters of mutual interest and concern, and will continue to explore various ideas for cooperation between the Council and the Housing Authority with regard to hawkers management and control.
The second part of the question concerns joint efforts between the Urban Services Department and the Housing Department in the control of illegal hawkers at the periphery of public housing estates boundaries.
As members are aware, the Housing Department is responsible for hawkers inside public housing estate boundaries and the Urban Services Department is responsible for those outside. However, there has been a good deal of cooperation at the district level between the District Hygiene Superintendents and the Housing Managers who frequently work hand in hand, and where necessary with the assistance of the Police, to devise strategies and operational plans to tackle specific hawker problems near or inside public housing estates. Where the hawker problem is particularly serious, major hawker raiding operations will be mounted jointly. In the past, there were one or two examples when unilateral action by one Department or the other did cause problems. However, this is a thing of the past and the Urban Services Department's close liaison with the Housing Department precludes any such recurrences.
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MR. DICKSON K. F. PANG (in English):—Mr. Chairman, could the Chairman of the Markets and Street Traders Select Committee tell us about the one or two cases in which there were problems caused by one Department taking unilateral action?
MR. HILTON CHEONG-LEEN (in English):—Mr. Chairman, as I said before, these happenings took place in the past and I don't think we ought to resuscitate them. I would rather say that there is a very close co-operation now between the Housing Authority and the Urban Services Department because there are certain areas where we have different approaches e.g. the Housing Authority has a strong commitment to resite the hawkers in public housing estates into Housing Authority markets and also new Housing Authority markets in new public housing estates may be located away from the established population centres and may not be sufficiently attractive to the hawkers to be resited. Another difference in approach is that the Housing Authority attempts to operate its markets on a commercial basis whereby stalls are let through open tender Council rentals for resited hawkers, on the other hand, usually involve a subsidy element. I hope this gives some idea of the difference in approach as between the Housing Authority and the Urban Services Department.
8. MR. CHAN TAK-CHOR asked the following question (in Cantonese):—Since no teaching pool for children is available in Kennedy Town Swimming Pools, the Council's children swimming course for the Central and Western District has to be run in its swimming pools in other districts or the swimming pool of a school in Central and Western District.
Despite that, I have learned that some private coaches still run swimming courses for children in Kennedy Town Swimming Pools. I worry that the swimming pools they use for teaching may not be suitable for such training purposes and accidents may easily occur. On the other hand, it is highly inconvenient for parents to bring their children to other districts to attend Council's swimming courses. Moreover, they often complained about that.
I would like to know:
(1) Has the Recreation and Sports Section (RSS) of the Central and Western District Office met any difficulties in organizing children swimming course in other swimming pools? Are there inadequacies in the children swimming courses of the district as compared with other districts? (please provide figures for reference)
(2) The Central and Western District Board has suggested allocating some space in Smithfield Joint-User Building to provide a teaching pool for children. Has the Council ever considered this proposal? Otherwise, what's the reason for rejecting it?
(3) Will the Council consider to convert the existing facilities of the Kennedy Town Swimming Pools, such as the children's pool and paddling pool etc. so that children may have a suitable pool to practise swimming there?
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