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Following is a question by the Hon Ho Chun-yan, and a written reply by the Secretary for Transport and Housing, Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung, in the Legislative Council today (June 19):
Question:
Regarding the supply and allocation of public rental housing (PRH) units, as well as the supply of Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) units, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) of the relevant information of each of the PRH and HOS projects completed/to be completed from 2013-2014 to 2016-2017, broken down by District Council (DC) district (set out in Tables 1 and 2);
(b) given that the Government indicated in its reply in April this year to this Council's question on the Estimates of Expenditure 2013-2014 that "[t]he HA [Hong Kong Housing Authority] has successfully secured enough land to ensure that a total of about 17 000 HOS flats will be completed over the four years from 2016-2017", of the relevant information on the sites concerned (set out in Table 3);
(c) whether, at present, there is any information regarding those sites which have already been committed for building PRH in 2018-2019 and 2019-2020; if so, of the locations and site areas of all such sites as well as the estimated number of units that can be provided;
(d) of the total number of PRH units, the number of vacant units and the percentage of such number of vacant units in the total number of units, and among the vacant units, the respective numbers of refurbished and newly constructed units as well as their respective proportions on December 31 of each year in 2010, 2011 and 2012 (set out in Table 4);
(e) of the total number of PRH units, the number of vacant units and the vacancy rate in each DC district on December 31 of each year in 2011 and 2012; and whether there were individual districts in which the PRH vacancy rates were relatively high; if so, of the reasons for that;
(f) whether the authorities will implement measures in the coming year to expedite the allocation of vacant PRH units to applicants; if they will, of the details;
(g) of the number of applicants who had been offered PRH units for the first time, the number of PRH units involved and the number of units accepted by these applicants in each of the past five financial years (and among such units, of the number of newly constructed and refurbished units and their respective proportions);
(h) among the PRH units accepted by the applicants in each of the past five financial years, of the number and percentage of PRH units allocated to applicants who had been offered a unit for the first time, broken down by district (i.e. urban areas, extended urban areas, the New Territories and Islands); and
(i) of the average time gap between the submission of applications by general PRH applicants and the acceptance of offers by such applicants in each of the past three financial years?
Reply :
President,
The Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) would ensure the effective use of public housing resources. As soon as newly completed units or refurbished units become available, they are promptly allocated to applicants on the Waiting List (WL) or other rehousing categories. WL applicants are given three offers from which to choose; whether the applicants accept the first, second or third offer is a matter of personal choice. If the applicants refuse to accept the offers, we will arrange allocation to other applicants by random computer batching. Thus, the vacant period for each unit depends on whether and if so, when the offer is accepted by the applicants. Generally speaking, there are always a number of units vacant at any one time. These include less popular units that have not been accepted after repeated offers, recycled units undergoing refurbishment and units specially reserved to cater for the rehousing of people affected by transfers or clearances, etc.
The reply to the various parts of the question raised by the Hon Albert Ho is as follows:
(a) Please refer to Annex 1 and Annex 2 for the information about the estimated public rental housing (PRH) production and the Home Ownership Scheme (HOS) production to be completed between 2013/14 and 2016/17 respectively.
(b) and (c) The HA has successfully secured sufficient land to ensure that a total of about 17 000 HOS flats will be completed over the four years from 2016/17. The first batch of HOS units to be completed in 2016/17 are located in Sha Tin, Tsuen Wan, Kwai Tsing and Yuen Long, providing a total of about 2 100 flats as shown in Annex 2. In addition, the Government has already announced its decision to increase the PRH production target to at least 100 000 units over the five years starting from 2018. For HOS and PRH projects to be completed beyond 2016/17, they are mostly at an early planning and design stage. Therefore, we cannot provide details of the sites concerned at this stage. The HA will consult the relevant District Councils according to the respective timetables for individual projects in light of their progress on planning and design work.
(d) As at December 31 of 2010, 2011 and 2012, the total numbers of lettable PRH flats and the number and percentage of lettable vacant flats are shown in the Table 5.
(e) The allocation of PRH units takes place based on four WL districts, namely, Urban, Extended Urban, New Territories and Islands. As at December 31, 2011 and December 31, 2012, the total number of PRH flats; the number of lettable vacant flats and vacancy rates of PRH units for different WL Districts are shown in the Table 6.
As PRH flats are recovered and let out everyday, the vacant flat figures listed in the table above only reflect the situation on that day.
(f) Housing Department (HD) has taken a multi-pronged approach to optimize the use of valuable public housing resources and expedite the letting of those units. These measures include -
(i) provision of 50 per cent rent reduction for 8 months in respect of units left vacant for 12 months or more but less than 24 months;
(ii) provision of 50 per cent rent reduction for 12 months in respect of units left vacant for 24 months or above; and
(iii) let out less popular flats through the Express Flat Allocation Scheme which is at present launched annually. This also serves to provide a fast track access to PRH for those WL applicants who have joined the scheme.
(g) and (h) In the past five years, HD has made an average of over 40 000 offers per year to WL applicants, which included 1st offers, 2nd offers and 3rd offers. However, only a portion of the offers were accepted by applicants, and HD has only kept statistics related to these accepted offers. Among the offers accepted by applicants each year, the number and percentage of applicants accepting 1st offers, 2nd offers and 3rd offers are shown in the Table 7.
The HD does not keep the breakdowns by districts.
(i) According to the existing mechanism, the Average Waiting Time (AWT) of PRH is computed counting from the time the applicant is registered on the WL to the time he/she received the 1st offer. In the past 3 fiscal years, i.e. as at end March of 2011, 2012 and 2013, the AWT of general WL applicants were 2 years, 2.6 years and 2.7 years respectively. The duration between submission of application and registration on the WL differs among applicants, and we do not compile statistics on the average time between the submission of applications and the final acceptance of PRH flats.
Ends/Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Issued at HKT 17:56
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