'Profit above conscience' angers councillors

Southern District councillors hit out strongly yesterday against a revised plan for an 80-year-old Renaissance-style mansion in Pok Fu Lam, with one saying the owner was "putting profit above conscience".

They were upset that the owner now plans to turn Jessville into apartments instead of preserving it as a clubhouse to which the public would have had limited access.

Allowing 50 visitors a month into the clubhouse, which was to be used by residents of planned adjacent high-rise apartment blocks, was one of the conditions that gained the support of the district council and the government and approval by the Town Planning Board.

The revised plan proposes dividing the old mansion into four apartments with a public viewing platform.

Only one adjacent multi-storey residential block is planned - down from two in the original plan - as the owner could not afford the high land premiums, the Post has learnt.

The building, originally built for barrister and magistrate William Ngar Tse Thomas Tam and now owned by a company, holds grade-three historic status, which means the owner is entitled to tear it down.