LEGISLATORS are to ask the Executive Council if it endorsed the special compensation granted to absentee-owners with multiple flats in the Kowloon Walled City.
This is despite a verbal ratification from the Director of Buildings and Lands, Mr Darwin Chen, that the top policy-making body had given an unequivocal decision that all owners must be compensated.
Legislators at the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) yesterday were concerned if the issue had been brought to the attention of Exco and the Finance Committee, as recommended in the report by Director of Audit, Mr Brian Jenney.
The grant to the absentee-owners has cost taxpayers an extra $91 million in excess of the statutory compensation, according to audit chief.
Questioned by legislators, Mr Chen said Exco had considered the case of absentee-owners, but had not given specific attention to whether these people had single or multiple flats.
He said the ''large corporate owners'' stated in Exco briefing papers in 1981 meant in fact ''owners of multiple flats''.