Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1967-1968 — Page 42

year 1967 and the Medical & Health Department has introduced a scheme to replace them by low-cost clinics in the charge of qualified or exempted medical practitioners, and housed on the ground floors of domestic blocks. During the year under review, 40 such clinics were allocated and 18 of them were in operation by the end of March.

91. Appendix 6 gives the details of welfare services and primary schools in estates.

COMMERCIAL PREMISES, SHOPS AND COTTAGE INDUSTRIES

92. One of the first modifications to the early resettlement blocks was the conversion of a number of ground floor rooms into shops or workshops. These were, of course, of the standard 120 or 240 square feet, and those squatters who had been operating shops or workshops of a kind suitable for accommodation in domestic blocks before they were resettled were thus able to continue in their business after moving. Some of the later blocks built from 1961 onwards also had shop spaces of 155 and 310 square feet, and other sizes have been built over the years, while the combination of adjacent premises adds further to the variety of sizes available. By the end of March 1968 8,326 ground floor rooms had been let as shops and 1,319 as workshops, the latter being in locations where the opportunities for retail trade are minimal. Among those set aside for shops, 860 bays were allocated as restaurants, 414 for the sale of fresh provisions, mainly meat and fish, and 76 for the sale of roast meat. The rest house a very wide miscellany of other trades including hairdressers and dry-cleaning depots. The ground floor work- shops similarly contain a great variety of small enterprises, while tenants have always been allowed to carry on certain simple and inoffensive cottage industries in their upper floor domestic rooms, as for example tailoring, assembling plastic goods, and knitting.

93. At the time that the original estates were built and occupied no provision had been made for squatter factories and as a result, many workshops or cottage industries were admitted to the estates which have proved to be unsatisfactory neighbours for domestic tenants. The depart- ment carried out a survey in the early part of the year of all small scale industries operating in the four oldest estates at Shek Kip Mei, Tai Hang Tung, Lei Cheng Uk and Hung Hom, which showed that nearly 5,300 cottage industries are being operated in upper floor domestic rooms. The possibility is being examined of finding alternative accom- modation for the more obnoxious of these industries.

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