LAND AND HOUSING
Government Housing
121
Hong Kong's resettlement estates have attracted worldwide atten- tion. Hundreds of thousands of people are being provided with homes by a building programme which, for speed and size has few, if any, parallels. By the end of 1971 the Hong Kong Government had become, through this programme, the landlord of about 1.2 million people or 30 per cent of the population.
The categories of people eligible for resettlement were laid down in order of priority in the 1964 White Paper 'Review of Policies for Squatter Control, Resettlement and Government Low-Cost Housing’ and have been subsequently revised on the recommendation of the Housing Board. These categories and the number of people resettled (or re-accommodated in the case of the relief of overcrowding category) during the year are:
Category 1: (a) Victims of fires and natural disasters, subject
to availability of accommodation 7,598
(b) All other cases recommended for compassionate resettlement by the Director of Social Welfare 4,502 Category 2: Occupants of squatter huts declared to be dan-
gerous 586 Category 3: Former domestic tenants of buildings demolished - as dangerous and subject to the Demolished Buildings
(Redevelopment of Sites) Ordinance 8,379
=
Category 4: Present occupants of cottage, licensed or resite areas or occupying tolerated structures on Crown land required for development 23,572
Category 5: Re-use of licensed areas 3,667
Category 6: Tenants of overcrowded resettlement rooms 2,143 Category 7: Pavement dwellers occupying tolerated struc-
tures nil
In 1964 the original seven-storey resettlement block design intro- duced 10 years before was abandoned in favour of a new design. At first the new blocks were of eight storeys and then 16, and differ fundamentally from the older ones in that access is from a central corridor on each floor instead of from external common balconies. This makes it possible to give each room a private balcony. Other improvements include refuse chutes, electric power and light points in domestic rooms (which had been the tenant's responsibility in the older designs), lifts in the 16-storey blocks and private lavatories
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