ENG-1995 — Page 259

LAND, PUBLIC WORKS AND UTILITIES

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Four sites with a total area of 13.62 hectares, were tendered under the Private Sector Participation Scheme in 1995. Sites granted to the Housing Authority for the development of Home Ownership Scheme projects included two sites comprising 11.84 hectares in Tin Shui Wai, Yuen Long, five sites comprising 2.75 hectares in Kowloon East and a 1.68-hectare site in Fanling.

Land for the construction of about 3 400 flats was granted in 1995-96 to the Hong Kong Housing Society for an assisted housing scheme for Hong Kong's ‘sandwich class' (those families not eligible for existing public housing assistance but who are unable to afford private sector flats). This was the third year in which land was granted to the Society for the scheme.

Major land transactions included the sale by auction of a commercial site in the Tamar Basin, Central (IL 8822, 0.348 hectare), for $3.351 billion; a 12.5-hectare site in Tai Po for a new campus for the Hong Kong Institute of Education and a five-hectare extension of the Third Industrial Estate at Tseung Kwan O.

Land Registration

Hong Kong operates a deeds registration system under the Land Registration Ordinance. The Land Registry is responsible for registering all documents affecting land. The Land Registry comprises the Urban Land Registry and eight New Territories Land Registries.

A land document is registered by delivering it to the appropriate land registry with - a form containing the essential particulars of the document and the prescribed fee. These particulars are then entered into a register for the relevant piece of land or property.

Each land register provides a complete picture of all transactions affecting a property, from the grant of the government lease. The registers, memorials and related land documents are available for search by members of the public at the respective land registries on payment of a small fee. A purchaser or mortgagee will, therefore, be able to check and satisfy himself from the land register as to the nature of the title he is intending to purchase or accept by way of security. An on-line computer search facility called the Direct Access Service (DAS) is also available. Subscribers to the DAS, mainly solicitors and other professional firms, can have direct access to the computerised registers and can place orders for copies of land records from computer terminals in their own offices without calling at the Land Registry.

All land registers in the Urban Land Registry are computerised. The land registers in the New Territories, presently in book form, are being computerised. The project is expected to be completed in early 1997.

All land documents presented for registration in the Urban Land Registry are microfilmed. Land documents kept by the New Territories Land Registries are still in paper form. The Land Registry is setting up a Document Imaging System (DIS) to convert land documents into electronic images which will be stored on optical discs. The imaged documents can be speedily retrieved and transmitted electronically through the DAS or other means. The DIS is scheduled to commence operation in mid-1996. The conversion of land documents will take 18 months.

The Land Registration Ordinance provides that all land documents registered under it shall have priority according to their respective dates of registration. If a