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The Housing Department (HD) spares no efforts in combating abuses of subsidised housing. Recently, an owner of a Tenants Purchase Scheme (TPS) flat and a finance company have been prosecuted for the offence of unlawful alienations.
A spokesman for the HD said today (October 26) that a case was heard in Kowloon City Magistrates' Courts on October 19 in which an owner of a TPS flat, located at Lei Cheng Uk Estate in Sham Shui Po, charged his TPS flat to a finance company by way of loan agreement, without paying a premium to the Housing Authority or obtaining prior approval from the Director of Housing. They were thus prosecuted for the offence of unlawful alienations. Eventually, the TPS owner and the finance company were convicted and ordered to pay fines of $5,000 and $8,000 respectively.
Under the Housing Ordinance, it is an offence for a subsidised housing flat owner to unlawfully mortgage, charge, assign or otherwise alienate their subsidised housing flat without paying a premium or obtaining prior approval from the Director of Housing, and such a transaction will also be void. Under Section 27A of the Housing Ordinance, a void alienation under Section 17B is an offence and the offender is liable to a fine of $500,000 and to imprisonment for one year. All owners of subsidised housing flats for which the premium has not been paid should observe and strictly comply with the alienations restriction stipulated in the Housing Ordinance in refinancing their flats with a view to not being prosecuted for the offence of unlawful alienations.
Ends/Monday, October 26, 2015
Issued at HKT 17:36
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