ENG-1967 — Page 171

LAND AND HOUSING

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The dangerous buildings division of the Buildings Ordinance Office continued to deal with buildings which, due to general dilapidation through age and neglect, presented unacceptable risks of collapse. Low standards of original construction, often make the surveyor's task an unenviable calculation of probabilities, complicated by the social distress inherent in dispossessing large numbers of, usually poor, people. The strenuous and practical steps taken by the government to care for these unfortunate members of the community are dealt with elsewhere in this chapter.

During the year under review the Building Authority declared 233 buildings dangerous, obtained Closure Orders and ordered the demolition of the buildings. In 18 cases the authority arranged contracts and supervised demolition work in default of compliance by the owners with the statutory orders to demolish. As a result of these operations to remove grave risks to the safety of occupants a total of 10,731 persons were evicted from their homes and places of business.

RESETTLEMENT

Hong Kong's resettlement estates have attracted worldwide attention. Hundreds of thousands of people are being provided with homes by a low-cost housing programme which, for speed and size, has few, if any, parallels. By the end of 1967 the Hong Kong Government had become, through this programme, the landlord of about 1,016,000 people or over a quarter of the population. A ceremony to mark the millionth settler was held in October, and present building plans aim at accommodating about 1.6 million by 1972. The programme is reviewed annually by the Housing Board to ensure that the needs of resettlement are balanced with those of other types of housing.

The government has accepted as a working basis the board's recommendations in its report for 1966-7. These, in brief, are that the balance between the resettlement and government low-cost building programmes should be adjusted to allow 650,000 individual units of resettlement accommodation and 350,000 units of govern- ment low-cost housing to be built between April 1, 1966 and March 31, 1972, and that a new type of resettlement block should be