ENG-1979 — Page 150

HOUSING AND LAND

Land Office

105

The issue, renewal, variation and termination of Crown leases are dealt with by the Land Office, a division of the Registrar General's Department. Records of transactions relating to land on Hong Kong Island, in Kowloon, New Kowloon (with a few exceptions) and some of the more urban parts of the New Territories are kept in the Land Office. Records relating to transactions affecting other parts of the New Territories and the few exceptional New Kowloon cases are kept at District Land Offices, operated by the New Territories Administration.

The Land Office has responsibility for the registration of all instruments affecting land; the settling and registration of conditions of sale, grant and exchange of Crown land; the granting of mining leases; the registration of owners' corporations; the apportionment of Crown rents and premiums; the enforcement of lease conditions; and the provision of conveyancing services for the Housing Authority in connection with the sale of flats built under the Home Ownership Scheme. It gives legal and other advice to the government generally on matters relating to land.

A special Crown Rent Collection Section was established in the Land Office during the year to deal with the recovery of outstanding Crown rents by issuing warning letters de- manding payment to defaulters, and, if necessary, proceeding with re-entry or vesting action. After a comprehensive survey of the existing system of registering, keeping and retrieving Land Office records, it was decided that all memorials, Crown leases and conditions of sale, grant and other documents should be kept in microfilm form. Arrangements were made during the year for microfilming to start in 1980.

The Land Registration Ordinance provides that all instruments registered under it shall have priority according to their respective dates of registration. This provision applies unless they are registered within one month of execution, in which case priority generally relates back to the date of the instrument. However, for charging orders and pending actions, priority runs from the commencement of the day following the date of actual registration. The ordinance also provides that unregistered instruments, other than bona fide leases at rack rent for any term not exceeding three years, shall be null and void as against any subsequent bona fide purchaser or mortgagee for valuable consideration. Registration is therefore essential to the protection of title, but does not guarantee it.

During the year, 170,054 instruments were registered in the Land Office, compared with 170,715 in 1978. More detailed statistics and comparisons with previous years are contained in Appendix 29. At the end of the year, the card index of property owners contained the names of 361,991 people, an increase of 24,122 over the previous year. Some own several properties, but most are owners or part-owners of small, individual flats.

Urban Renewal and Environmental Improvement

To assist the Hong Kong Housing Society's urban improvement scheme, the government resumed 38 properties in Hee Wong Terrace, Kennedy Town, and six properties in Wing Fung Street, Wan Chai, in early 1979. The Housing Society plans to build at each site a 'garden estate' type of redevelopment consisting of 10 four-storey detached or semi-detached apartment blocks and a 21-storey block on a podium. Negotiations with former owners on the amount of compensation for their properties were held in 1979; all eligible former occupiers are being rehoused and given ex-gratia compensation.

Two sites which are part of the Urban Renewal Pilot Scheme were sold for a total of $141 million in 1979, adding to the accumulated revenue of $387.5 million derived from

Page 150Page 151