Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1958-1959 — Page 14

part similarly overcrowded. In a number of cases, however, they are occupied by comparatively well-to-do 'squatters'. These houses have mostly been built on leased agricultural land, contrary to the lease conditions, either by the lessees themselves, who then rent them out, or by immigrants who purchased sites from the lessees.

27. The families living in these areas vary greatly in their economic and social status and have come from many different parts of China. The Cantonese are usually in the majority but there are also large numbers of Chiuchow speaking persons from the Swatow region and northerners from Shanghai or further north. At one extreme there is a very small minority whose family incomes may exceed $1,000 a month, and who may be employed by the Government or by large firms; at the other there are the families in wooden huts, many of whom have no regular employment and whose average earnings from casual labour or hawking are often less than $100 per month.

28. All these squatters are in illegal occupation of land and are liable to eviction, as indeed are those who have squatted on the roof- tops of tenement buildings, or in side streets and scavenging lanes. But the amount of resettlement accommodation is limited and priority is given to the clearance of land required for development. In selecting areas for clearance the criterion is the degree of urgency with which the land is required, and not the degree of need of the squatters them- selves; and when an area is scheduled for clearance, all the squatters living within the area are offered resettlement without discrimination.

29. About three months before the final date of a clearance, teams from the Screening Unit of the Department make a comprehensive survey of the area. Every structure is investigated and the particulars recorded on the screening form include the number of persons living in the structure; their names, ages and relationships; identity card numbers; length of residence in the structure and in the Colony; occupations and places of employment; and the average monthly income of the family. Further particulars are needed if the structure is used for business purposes or as a workshop. This information will also be of value later on when it will be passed to the officer-in-charge of the resettlement estate or area into which the squatter is to be moved. 30. It is at this stage that personal contact is made for the first time between the staff of the Department and the squatter. The screener's job may be quite simple or very hard. He must check the details of each household as supplied to him by the head of household against the number of identity cards, the bed-spaces available in the hut and

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