ENG-1956 — Page 183

HOUSING

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are 184 cottages let at a monthly rental of $30 to families whose income is below $350 a month. The total population of the estate is 1,032.

The Housing Society now manages a total of 1,177 flats, cottages, or shops, housing some 7,100 people. Construction has been financed by loans at low interest, totalling some

17 million so far, from the Colony's Development Fund. Site formation has been carried out with grants from the United Kingdom's Colonial Development and Welfare Funds.

Other Societies interested in low-cost housing, not in Resettlement areas, include the Hong Kong Model Housing Society, which in 1952 completed 100 flats in an estate at North Point and in subsequent years has added a further 200 flats; and the Hong Kong Economic Housing Society, which in 1956 completed its estate housing 280 families at Lady Grantham Villas in Kowloon.

Amongst employers, there have been two tendencies, the first of which is exemplified by the cotton mills and other modern factories which have included in their premises modern dormitory accommodation for workers. The second method, that of constructing flats for employees and their families, has been followed, for example, by the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation which has erected 200 flats for its local staff; the Hong Kong Tramways which has already built 160 flats at North Point and is planning a further 100; the China Motor Bus Company which houses 200 workers and their families; and the Hong Kong Electric Company which has provided accommodation for 259 of its employees. The response of employers, however, to this scheme has for the most part been disappointing.

In its own field as an employer, Government has fostered the formation of co-operative building societies by offering loans to groups of local civil servants on the pensionable establishment to enable them to purchase land and construct blocks of flats. By the end of 1956 33 building co-operatives