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LAND AND HOUSING
25 factories will be resettled provided they change their trade to one suitable for operation in resettlement factories.
People who opened up Crown land for cultivation without legal tenure before October 1954 are given ex-gratia cash compensation when this land is cleared for development. During the year $133,442 was paid to cultivators against the clearance of 3.97 acres. Large- scale pig breeders on Crown land are also compensated when they are cleared, and such people were paid $11,000 during the year.
New squatting, including extensions to existing ‘tolerated' illegal structures, is prevented as far as possible. Periodical surveys are made, and all structures then surveyed are tolerated until their clearance is required for development; any erected subsequently are demolished as soon as they are discovered. The squatter popula- tion is gradually decreasing as clearances take effect and the lan- guishing pace of redevelopment of old private property results in a decline in new squatting. The number of squatters (as distinct from people in resite or licensed areas) had dropped from 463,000 at April 1, 1965 to 429,000 two years later, and by the end of 1967 the figure stood at 405,000. During the year, there were 12,988 demolitions of illegal, untolerated structures or illegal extensions to tolerated ones. A total of 23,338 people were allocated sites in licensed areas to build huts pending resettlement to estates. These licensed areas are similar to the former resite areas but a small fee is charged for a site. Entrants to licensed areas include, among others, boat squatters from typhoon anchorages; people not eligible for resettlement, left behind after squatter clearance and resettlement operations; squatters from demolished new huts; victims of natural disasters and fires; street sleepers; overspills from congested squatter huts; people affected by tenement redevelopment, and people from dangerous tenements either not eligible, or not opting for, the rent advance scheme (see below). At the same time, 54,079 inhabitants of the old resite areas (which are being run down) were resettled into estates.
The number of tenants evicted from dangerous pre-war buildings was one of the factors taken into account in a re-examination of resettlement policy in 1964. While the law already provided for compensation to be paid by landlords, tenants were not eligible for resettlement. The Review of Policies for Squatter Control,
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