Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1958-1959 — Page 28

A daily ballot for sites in the bazaars is held by an officer of the Urban Services Department and the hawking of goods in any areas of Shek Kip Mei and Tai Hang Tung outside the two bazaars is prohibited. Stalls have also been erected in Wong Tai Sin Estate and similar bazaars are planned for Jordan Valley, Chai Wan and Kwun Tong when these estates are started.

64. It is also the responsibility of the estate staff to see that the conditions of all tenancy cards are observed. These conditions are made as simple as possible, the most important being that the rent must be paid in advance each month on the rent day; that the tenant may not transfer his room to any other person or sublet any part of it; and that he must not allow the commission in his room of any offence against the laws of the Colony. For workshops there are additional special conditions, and restaurants, cafes and food shops are bound by the Urban Council licence conditions.

65. If the conditions of a tenancy card are not observed verbal warnings are given by the staff, to be followed, if necessary, by pre- liminary and final warning letters. In most cases these warnings are effective; but if no notice is taken of final written warning it is necessary to terminate the tenancy and to require the tenant and his family to vacate the premises. So far as rent payments are concerned, the condi- tions of the tenancy card provide for cancellation as soon as the monthly rent is in arrears, but these tenancies are not in fact terminated unless either the rent is more than twenty eight days in arrears or unless the tenant is persistently more than fourteen days late in making his rent payments. A total of 270 tenancies had to be terminated during the year under review; 212 were terminated for non-payment of rent, 55 for unauthorized transfers and 3 for trafficking in heroin or opium.

66. In order to spread rent collections over the whole month each estate is divided into sections, each of which has a different rent day. If for example the rent day for a section is the 12th the rent paid on that date will be for the month ending on the 12th of the following month. As all the rooms in each section have the same rent day it is easier for the estate staff to remind settlers when payments are due. Regular and constant attention is paid by the staff to this matter and out of a total of $7,087,633 due in rents for the financial year 1958/59 only $5,226 had to be written off as irrecoverable arrears.

67. The Urban Council is kept in close touch with the problems of the multi-storey estates in two ways. Firstly, through its Resettlement

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