People living in factories seek public housing

People facing eviction by the government from industrial buildings where they are living illegally, demanded yesterday that they be given public housing instead of being sent to a temporary shelter where they will have to share room with strangers.

About seven industrial buildings in Tai Kok Tsui have been identified as having subdivided flats, and the Buildings Department has ordered them evacuated because they are unhygienic firetraps. But the tenants say the eviction will make them homeless without giving them appropriate housing.

Li Hung-ha, 36, was among about 20 tenants who met officials from the Housing Authority yesterday to express their grievances. An unemployed mother with a one-year-old baby, Li lives in one of the blocks with 38 other tenants on her floor, which is divided into three floors by wooden boards. She pays HK$1,500 per month for a 40-square-metre unit.

'The rent and deposit for a private flat [of about the same size] can cost as much as HK$2,500,' Li said. 'There's no lift and you have to walk seven or eight floors. It is simply too expensive for my baby and me.'

The operation to clear converted homes in industrial blocks was launched recently. Officials say the haphazard partitions can easily cause short circuits and fires, and conditions are unhygienic.

All the tenants in Li's block received a letter from the Buildings Department in September, giving them one month's notice to move out. More than a month has passed, and the tenants live in fear every day that their homes will be confiscated.