APPENDIX III
234
Additional note ra Endowments and Buildings
Endowment of Professorships.
No. HKUAC 330
The West Indies Committee in Para 174 of its Report recommends that H.N. Goverment should supply funds for the endowment of "basic" professorship and for the establishment of a research funda The reasons stated are to minimize the effects of chanye cr fortune and to ensure the continuance of the University through hard times » The Report adds "Endowment of this nature would go far towards assuring the future of the University and would give a feeling of confidence alike to the people of the West Indies and the Council of the University",
The wisdom of the proposal is manifest to men who have struggled to keep essential work going in hard times.
The Committee selecta as "key chains" those of English, History, Mathematics,Physics, Chemistry, Physiology, In Hong Kong it would be necessary to add, I think, Chinese and Social science, eight in all; and on the West Indies Committee's estimate the total of the endowments would be £400,000. The Research Fund they assess at £200,000. If these endowments are to be recomended we should have to ask for a non-recurring grant of £800,000 but the non-recurring expenditure would thereby be reduced from £161,630 to £149,650 and the annual grant asked of the Imperial Government from £100,000 to £88,000.
site and Buildings.
It is difficult to assess the value of the site of the University of Hong Kong. The rapid growth of the town on all sides of the University has inflated land values and if the growth continues, as it is expected to do, the site may well be worth £1 million, To maintain the existing bad buildings not only increases the difficulty of any good work but it is a continuing economic iniquity in that a valuable site is so misused by bad placing of buildings and by bad planning; we are wasting a great part of the value of our major endowmont. By erecting steel framed buildings of four or five floors we fold and at the could increase accomodation three or farr same time increase the area for gunes and amenities of living by hardly less.
Before the war, constructional steel, cement, bricks, hardwood were cheaper than in U.K. and building labour was very much cheaper but not less efficient. Imported fittings wore
slightly dearer. In 1940 when a new science building was completed it was estimated that the all-in cost was not more than
A gradual process 65% of what it would have been in the U.K.
of rebuilding which should retain only about a fourth of the existing buildings will have to be undertaken if the University thrives. Costs of building in the next years are likely to be much increased because so much in the town has to be rebuilt after fires and bombardment. Wages are bound to increase and materials to become dearer. Three years hence the conditions may well be mere favourable. A capital sum of £1,130,000 is expected to suffice
A sum for a wide range of new building in the West Indies. of perhaps slightly less than £1 million spent during the period 1949 and 1955 would give the University in Hong Kong adequate laboratories, libraries, lecture rooms, hostels, houses and accommodation for students' clubs and societies.
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