CO129-629-8 Social policy 1-12-1949 - 31-12-1951 — Page 3

る。

The main reasons for the existence of this situation are mentioned in Mr. Sidebotham's note at No. 4. They are

briefly :- The aftermath of the Japanese occupation (involving considerable physical damage, apart from the disruption of the economic life of the Colony); the vast increase in the population of the Colony (from considerably under a million in 1939, to something over 2 millions at the present time); the very great shortage of suitable housing sites (the creation of which involves either ecclamations or the costly levelling of sites in the Hong Kong hillsides) and, the general financial position of the Colony. This last mentioned factor is of such relevance that at my suggestion,

7. Mr. Sidebotham has now prepared the additional note at No. 7.

reliance

4.. It looks very much as though the pre-war orange on private enterprise to provide housing for the poorer sections of the population will have to go. As to what should now be done to relieve the appalling congestion, we have been waiting for the views of the Hong Kong Government as a result of their study of the Abercrombie Report. In normal times, we should have pressed the Hong Kong Government for these views at an earlier date. But we have been refraining from doing so for the reason that, ever since the decision, taken last spring to reinforce the garrison of Hong Kong (with its further very much greater reinforcement in the summer) those officers (especially in the P.W.D.) who weke in normal times could have been expected to be working on the Abercrombie Peport, have had their hands more than fully occupied in assisting the army to provide not only living accommodation but all sorts of ancillary services. This factor has also, no doubt, led to the diversion to these objects of much of the capacity of private building contractors. But I entirely agree that we cannot allow the matter to drift much longer, and shall have to take up with the Governor the question whether the Government itself should not now on a large scale, enter the field of housing. But it is no use disregarding the facts that this would involve the expenditure of very large sums of public money, and a considerable expansion in the staff of the P..D. This again will involve considerable further expenditure, not to mention the provision of additional accommodation for the increased staff of the department ( in this connection I should mention that the extreme shortage of European type housing has hitherto been a very serious limiting factor on the expansion of European staffs in long Kong).

5.

It is in this connection that Mr. Sidebotham's note at

3

/ No. 7.