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Following is a question by the Hon Wong Kwok-hing and a written reply by the Secretary for Transport and Housing, Ms Eva Cheng, in the Legislative Council today (June 22):
Question:
The Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) launches the Territory-wide Overcrowding Relief (TWOR) transfer exercises and Living Space Improvement Transfer Scheme (LSITS) every year to enable public rental housing (PRH) tenants living below 5.5 square metres and 7 square metres internal floor area (IFA) per person respectively to apply for transfer to larger flats. Yet, some PRH tenants have relayed to me that when they inquiried about such exercises and scheme, HA staff said that they could only be allocated larger flats in remote areas such as Tin Shui Wai and Tung Chung, etc., instead of being transferred to larger flats in the same area where they are living (same area) or in the same district for PRH allocation (same district). In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) of the numbers of PRH tenants living below 5.5 square metres and 7 square metres IFA per person respectively at present, with a breakdown by the four districts of urban, extended urban, the New Territories and the islands;
(b) in the past three years, of the respective numbers of TWOR and LSITS applications received by HA, the tenants successfully transferred, and among such tenants, those who were transferred to flats in the same area or the same district;
(c) of the numbers of PRH flats set aside every year by the authorities for transfer under the aforesaid exercises and scheme; whether such flats are set aside in every district; if so, of the number of flats available for transferring overcrowded households every year, with a breakdown by district; if not, the reasons for that;
(d) whether the Housing Department has guidelines to instruct its staff to restrict applicants of the aforesaid exercises or scheme to be transferred to PRH flats in remote areas only when the flats available for transferring overcrowded households in the applicants' districts are occupied or insufficient; if it has, of the reasons for that; if not, whether applicants can still wait for transfer under such exercises and scheme to larger flats in the same area or the same district, and of the average waiting time; and
(e) whether HA will proactively issue letters in the future to PRH tenants living below 5.5 square metres and 7 square metres IFA per person to invite them to participate in the aforesaid exercises and scheme, so as to resolve the problem of overcrowdedness of PRH households; whether the authorities will enhance training for frontline staff and step up publicity among tenants, so that they will understand the details of the transfer schemes for overcrowded households and will not be misled?
Reply:
President,
In general, eligible public rental housing (PRH) households can apply for transfer to the reserved flats with larger size in their present Waiting List district or other districts (* Note), through the Territory-wide Overcrowding Relief Exercise (TWOR) and the Living Space Improvement Transfer Scheme (LSITS) to improve their living conditions. In 2005, the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) relaxed the locality restriction under the two schemes. All eligible PRH households with over ten years of residence in PRH can apply for transfer to reserved flats with larger size in any geographical districts. In other words, eligible PRH households with over ten years of residence in PRH can select any vacant flat in the New Territories (NT), Islands, Extended Urban or even Urban district under the schemes according to the actual circumstances and their own needs, irrespective of the districts they resided.
My reply to the five-part question is as follows:
(a) As at end March 2011, there were about 3 230 PRH households with a living area below 5.5 square metres per person, of which about 1 490, 1 000, 10 and 730 households resided in PRH flats located in the Urban, Extended Urban, Islands and NT districts respectively. The number of PRH households with a living area below 7 square metres per person was about 25 060, of which about 11 030, 8 160, 130 and 5 740 households resided in PRH flats located in the Urban, Extended Urban, Islands and NT districts respectively.
(b) In the past three years (i.e. 2008/09 to 2010/11), under the TWOR and LSITS, the Housing Department (HD) received a total number of about 5 330, 5 140 and 5 460 eligible applications respectively, of which about 2 620, 1 810 and 1 850 households accepted the flats offered. Of these, about 2 070, 1 490 and 1 520 households respectively were allocated flats in the same Waiting List district they resided in.
(c) The Subsidized Housing Committee of the HA will earmark flats for the purpose of the TWOR and LSITS when endorsing the Annual Public Rental Housing Allocation Plan. In the past year (i.e. 2010/11), 1 500 flats were earmarked for the two schemes. The number of flats set aside for the two schemes is not a restrictive provision and can be flexibly redeployed in conjunction with the flats earmarked for other types of transfers with a view to better utilisation of the public housing resources.
Before applications are invited under these schemes, the HA will earmark flats in respective Waiting List districts for applicants, subject to the availability of public housing resources at that time. In the past year, over 70% of the flats earmarked for the schemes were situated in the Urban and Extended Urban districts, while the rest were situated in the Islands and NT districts.
(d) Under the principle of rational allocation of public housing resources, public housing resources will first be allocated to the most needy people. As such, living density is set as the foremost criterion in determining the flat selection priority under the two schemes. Households with a smaller living area per person will be accorded a higher priority in flat selection. Applicants can select their own flats under the schemes in accordance with the authorised household size in their tenancies, the prevailing allocation standards and locality restrictions. Also, as mentioned above, households with over ten years of residence in PRH can select any vacant flats in the NT, Islands, Extended Urban or even Urban district irrespective of the districts they resided under the schemes according to the actual circumstances and their own needs, without any locality restriction.
The TWOR and LSITS are not conducted in the form of waiting lists. As such, there is no waiting time for applicants under the two schemes.
(e) Under the principle of rational allocation of public housing resources, priority is given to PRH households with a living area below 5.5 square metres per person to relieve their congested living condition. We will issue invitation letters to these households when the TWOR is launched. For the LSITS, we will inform PRH residents of the scheme through notices, posters, Estate Management Advisory Committees, estate newsletters, newspapers and the HD website, and eligible households who are interested in the scheme can apply.
When launching the schemes, we will continue to issue guidelines with details on the arrangements and application criteria, etc to frontline staff to facilitate them to answer enquiries from applicants.
* Note: Other districts mean: (i) households residing in PRH flats located in the Extended Urban/Islands district can apply for transfer to the Extended Urban/Islands/New Territories (NT) district; (ii) households residing in PRH flats located in the NT district can apply for transfer within the NT district; and (iii) households residing in PRH flats located in the Urban district can apply for transfer to the Urban/Extended Urban/Islands/NT district.
Ends/Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Issued at HKT 15:05
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