1965 — Page 271

of 382

Page 271 of 382

520

HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL

pointed out, paragraph 46 of our statement of aims provides. Nor in- deed could we implement the Sales formula, or Mr. BERNACCHI's sugges- tion that resettlement should be made available to former tenants of buildings excluded from the provisions of the Landlord and Tenant Ordinance, as recommended by Mr. SALES on the 1963 Working Party on Squatters and Resettlement, without such a review. Any change resulting from a review would require the endorsement of the Housing Board and the approval of the Governor in Council. The present build- ing programme is 900,000 units of 24 sq. ft. over a period of six years. Actual completions will of course vary from year to year, but the total quantity of new resettlement housing over the period is, within narrow limits, fixed. It follows that if Members wish to speed up the resettle- ment of boat squatters, or the decantation programme, or to introduce entirely new categories such as the tenants of exclude tenements, it can only be done by cutting back the numbers resettled from other categories. Do you wish, for example, to reduce the small quota for compassionate cases, or to refuse resettlement to squatters cleared from land required for development? It is no solution to say "increase the building programme": that can have no effect for at least five years, and meanwhile we are stuck with a pint pot, a pretty big pint mind you, into which no amount of juggling with categories or priorities will squeeze a quart of tenants.

24. Dr. BELL said there has been no slum clearance programme and suggested various ways of carrying one out. She may not be aware that a Working Party under the Chairmanship of my friend the Director of Public Works has been studying the question of slum clearance inten- sively over the last year, and that the Working Party has recently com- pleted its report and submitted it to Government. I suggest that rather than reviewing our priorities now, we might wait a little longer until we have had a chance to see the Working Party's recommendations, for it may be that they will affect some of our present resettlement com- mitments.

25. Before leaving the question of housing priorities, may I suggest that the time for replacing our old estates has not yet come.

One may legitimately hope that one day this will be possible, or that we can carry out the intention of the original designers of Mark I blocks and convert adjacent rooms into small flats. But until we are much further ahead with rehousing people who are now living in worse conditions than those that prevail in our old estates, it would be idle to add to the burden by pulling down any of the accommodation we already have.

26. With these words, Mr. Chairman, I have pleasure in supporting the motion before this Council. (Applause).

HONG KONG URBAN COUNCIL

521

DIRECTOR OF SOCIAL WELFARE:-Mr. Chairman, no less than eight Members have referred to various aspects of the hawker problem in More than one speaker has paid tribute to the course of this Debate. the unremitting efforts of the Hawkers Select Committee to reconcile, on a practical day-to-day basis, the legitimate interests of licensed hawkers with those of residents, shopkeepers and passengers through our streets, and with hygiene. This is a complex and delicate operation for which the Committee has met no less than 23 times during the year and considered 95 discussion papers.

2.

We have pressed on with the gazetting and marking of main streets as prohibited to hawking and some 400 streets or areas have now been so marked. The Select Committee has also succeeded in sorting out several groups of hawkers into orderly bazaars. These latter measures are to everyone's benefit; but they depend for their success on free space and control staff, neither of which are available to anything like the extent required. But steady improvement should result from pressing on with these two measures wherever practicable and the Council intends to do so.

3. In a few urban areas real progress has been made; but with some 50,000 pedlar hawkers, a majority unlicensed, the scale of the problem is formidable. Mr. LOBO has called for a general review of the Council's policy on hawking; the many references in this Debate are surely evidence of Members' increasing concern and I would personally support this proposal. Indeed I understand that the Assistant Director of Urban Services responsible has already begun a careful study of the present situation, which would provide valuable background; in the course of such a review, the merits of restricting pedlar hawker licences, which was suggested by two or three Members, could well be studied.

4. Several Members urged that means be found to encourage mem- bers of families who now earn their living by hawking, to move into industry, for instance by enabling them to take suitable training courses; this is indeed the subject of the thirty fourth paragraph in the Statement of Aims for 1966 which we are debating. Vacancies in factories, many with their own training schemes, were notified by means of handbills in hawker areas in recent months but there was little response; such vacancies are fewer now but further efforts need to be made in this direction. Voluntary welfare agencies could for instance be invited to offer vacancies in selected training courses to members of needy hawker families, as an experiment; I do not of course know to what extent this idea would be practicable or fruitful. I would also hope, with Mr. FUNG Hon-chu, that the newly formed Industrial Training Advisory Committee, which is about to set up Committees to study six of our main industries, would later be able to offer valuable guidance and advice.