Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1964-1965 — Page 10

persons with high priority for resettlement are permitted to build their huts against the payment of a licence fee while they are waiting for resettlement accommodation to become available. As with licensed areas, basic facilities will be provided and these transit centres will be con- trolled by the Commissioner for Resettlement.

8. Lastly, the White Paper proposes a stepped-up building programme of 900,000 resettlement units (a unit being defined as 24 square feet of designed living space per adult) over the six years ending 31st March, 1970, with a technical planning target of 1,900,000 units up to April 1974. The estimated capital cost of these two programmes is respectively $766,000,000 and $1,691,000,000.

9. By the end of the year plans to put into effect the policies con- tained in the White Paper were well under way. Drafting of the neces- sary new legislation was receiving priority, while departmental proce- dures to handle entry to, and the administration of, licensed areas and transit centres were completed. Close liaison with the Crown Lands and Survey Office of the Public Works Department had produced a number of new sites suitable for transit centres and licensed areas, and the plan- ning of water supply schemes for these, where necessary, had started. People were already being resited to existing resite areas which will eventually be converted into either transit centres or licensed areas, in accordance with the policies set out in the White Paper, while an offer of immediate resettlement against advance payment of rent was on the point of being made at the end of the year to the former domestic tenants of condemned buildings living in resite areas. The department was also geared to the immediate application of the rent advance scheme to domestic tenants coming out of future dangerous buildings. Lastly, again in consultation with the Superintendent of Crown Lands and Survey, clearance programmes had been adjusted to take account as far as possible of the new priorities for resettlement.

10. To meet its increased commitments the department underwent considerable expansion during the year, a total of 144 new posts being approved by supplementary provision. Three of the department's four divisions Estates/Areas, Operations and Works-came under examina- tion, and proposals for reorganizing and expanding them to meet the challenges ahead were made and approved. Proposals for improving the quality of staff by means of a training programme allied with more at- tractive conditions of service were still being examined at the end of March.

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