'All means' vowed to get dumpers
Illegal dumpers destroying green areas of the New Territories will be pursued using all available laws, an official from the Environment Bureau has told the Sunday Morning Post.
'What we intend to do is to send out a message that we will explore every possible channel that is available under the law and the government as a whole is serious about that,' the official said.
'If this message goes out across the New Territories community, hopefully people will not take advantage to dump indiscriminately.'
The official said any action would have to respect the rights of property holders. 'We are talking about private land,' the official said.
The warning comes as investigations continue into the latest dumping case to cause public outcry. Farmland in Ho Sheung Heung village, Sheung Shui, in the New Territories was covered in building rubble transported from a government construction site in Wo Hop Shek on July 15.
Last week Sheung Shui Rural Committee chairman Bowie Hau Chi-keung led volunteers in a replanting effort, covering the site with mango, papaya and guava saplings in a bid to demonstrate it remained fertile and dissuade the government from imposing a penalty.
However, the Planning Department ordered 24 landowners to remove the waste and plant grass by September 30.
The Ma family, which controls the Tai Sang Bank and the listed Tai Sang Land Development, owns lots at the eastern end of the dumping site through a private entity known as Kam Chan & Company.
Company secretary Amy Ma Ching-sau had said earlier it was following up the matter but declined to say whether the company had consented to the dumping.
Offenders can be prosecuted under the waste disposal and town planning ordinances.
The government has said there is a prima facie case against the contractor at a site from which at least some of the waste had come, for not abiding by dumping rules. That could lead to the contractor being barred from government tenders.
A truck driver who was working at the Wo Hop Shek site has also been asked to assist investigations. Police have extended the bail of a 43-year-old man arrested on July 13 who admitted dumping waste at the site.
It is legal in Hong Kong for construction material to be left on private land as long as the landowner agrees.
