Resettlement_Department_Annual_Report_1972-1973 — Page 7

CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTION

THE Resettlement Department was created in April 1954 to undertake the control and rehousing of squatters, and to manage the first of the new resettlement estates and the cottage areas which had been established in an attempt to contain the squatter problem.

2. Squatting became a serious problem in Hong Kong after the Second World War. The Colony's population had dropped to 600,000 by 1945 but by 1950 returning residents and new refugees from China, had increased the population to over 2,300,000. Accommodation already overcrowded and badly depleted during the war years was inadequate, and those who could not find conventional housing built shacks illegally wherever they could.

3. Efforts were made on a small scale to contain the squatting, but it was the disaster at Shek Kip Mei on Christmas Day, 1953 when a fire in a densely crowded squatter area left more than 50,000 people homeless, that precipitated the Government into large scale public housing. Within weeks, temporary two-storey buildings were erected on the fire site, but they were quickly replaced by multi-storey housing blocks which were taken-over by the newly-created Resettlement Department.

4. In 1964 the Legislative Council approved a White Paper entitled 'Review of Policies for Squatter Control, Resettlement and Government Low Cost Housing' as a general guide to future policy. The Paper set out priorities to be followed, as far as possible, in determining eligibility for resettlement, and recommended an increased resettlement Building programme. It also provided for the setting up of 'licensed areas' on which, for a fee, the genuinely homeless could build huts. Strict control of new squatting was to be enforced, and existing struc- tures were to be tolerated until they could be cleared.

5. By the end of March 1973 the Resettlement Department was managing over 500 blocks in 25 housing estates and eight factory estates. It was also managing 14 cottage areas. 1,233,584 persons were

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