Crown Rents
18. Tables V and VI give details of the numbers of lots on the Principal and Village Rent Rolls. The number of lots on the Principal Rent Roll has increased by 1,119 to 19,971, and the total Crown Rent by $444,000 to $2,197,730,54. The increases of 407 Inland Lots, 463 Kowloon Inland Lots and 132 Kowloon Marine Lots are for the most part due to the splitting up of several large lots into separate house sites, for each of which a new lot number has been given.
19. The number of lots in the Village Rent Roll has dropped to 1,324, 292 less than in 1958/59. The drop is almost entirely due to resumptions at Chai Wan, where the number of lots was reduced from 548 to 259. The total of the Village Rent Roll was on 31st March, 1960 only $1,068.10. Since the cost of collecting the rents on this Roll, the vast majority of which are under $1.00, was out of all proportion to the amounts received, Government in January 1960 notified lessees by letter and by a notification in the Gazette that in future Demand Notes for Crown rents of less than $5.00 per annum will in future normally be issued every five years instead of annually.
20. The Crown Rents of 224 sections of lots were determined under the Crown Rents (Apportionment) Ordinance (Cap. 125). Apportionment of Crown rent under this Ordinance is a procedure which enables the owner of a piece of land forming part of a larger area held under a Crown Lease to have his proportion of the total Crown rent payable for the whole area determined, and thereafter to hold his section as if a separate Crown Lease for it had been granted to him at the rent so determined.
Fees
21. Land Office fees collected during the year amounted to $608,270.00 as follows:
Deeds registration and Miscellaneous
Crown Leases
Apportionment of Crown Rents
$556,775
48,334
3,161
$608,270
This total, the highest ever, exceeds the previous year's total by more
than $70,000.
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