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The Government today (July 12) passed again to the Legislative Council (LegCo) Secretariat all the nine letters which the Lands Department has sent to the Henderson Land Development Company Limited (HLD) regarding the 24 transactions of 39 Conduit Road, covering the period from March 18, 2010 to July 5, 2010.
The Government has already passed to the LegCo on July 5, 2010 before the Housing Panel meeting all the eight letters sent by the Lands Department to HLD, covering the period from March 18, 2010 to June 30 2010, after HLD passed to the LegCo their replies earlier that day.
Subsequently, the Government passed to the LegCo on July 9, 2010 Lands Department's further letter sent in the late afternoon of July 5, 2010 to HLD informing the company that the Government had passed to the LegCo earlier that day all the letters sent by the Lands Department to HLD.
Separately, at the request of the LegCo Secretariat, the Government passed to the LegCo on July 9, 2010 photocopies of the stamped Agreements for Sale and Purchase (ASPs) for the 24 concerned transactions, which do not form part of the correspondence between Lands Department and HLD. Those ASPs were registered with Land Registry and members of the public have access to them.
"Since there is concern by some LegCo members that the LegCo may not have received all the exchange of correspondence between the Lands Department and HLD in their entirety, notwithstanding that the Administration has already passed to the LegCo all the nine letters by Lands Department to HLD in their entirety, we are passing to the LegCo a copy of the duplicate set of the exchange of correspondence between the Lands Department and HLD regarding the 24 concerned transactions of 39 Conduit Road in chronological order and include all attachments," a Government spokesman said.
"Under normal circumstances, the Government will not disclose information relating to a case which is under investigation by the law enforcement agencies, lest it will adversely affect and prejudice ongoing investigations or undermine any future actions that the Government may take upon completion of the investigations."
The spokesman said that the decision by HLD to release their letters has however changed the situation by removing one of the major legal considerations, i.e. the possibility of any prejudicial effect on HLD resulting from the disclosure of the correspondence.
Ends/Monday, July 12, 2010
Issued at HKT 18:52
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