House in disorder
Rural land use in the New Territories must be addressed because it will become a political hot potato. Past administrations failed to deal with it. The current one prefers not to have to address it, and anyone thinking of being a part of the 2012 administration had better think about it now. There are too many time bombs just waiting to explode if they are not skilfully defused.
Take the controversy over a piece of land at Sai Wan village near the Sai Kung East Country Park. A buyer bought it to build a large private home with a tennis court and helicopter pad. Once clearing started and the defacement became visible, conservation groups alerted officials, and news of it led to a public outcry that an area of outstanding natural beauty was being ruined.
The site was covered by an alert system for private development but the government didn't receive any application that would have triggered it. In view of the mounting public pressure, work was suspended. Meanwhile, concern groups have complained to the police, corruption agency and ombudsman. In their view, government departments failed in their duty by not preventing work from beginning in the first place.
There are many unzoned areas that may be ecologically valuable or of outstanding natural beauty, which should be properly protected but are not because of years of neglect. Officials apparently didn't expect development of remote sites and never found the time to put in comprehensive legislative controls.
Rural planning issues are complex. Villagers, rural politicians, district councils, landowners, developers and government officials have conflicting interests, on top of which conservation groups and the public are now demanding transparency in decision-making and better planning and regulation of rural land.
The Sai Wan case has stirred concern groups to dig for information. They found out that there are apparently more than 40 plots of unzoned land in To Kwa Peng, an abandoned village at the southern end of Long Harbour enclosed by the Sai Kung East Country Park that were bought in 2008 by a district councillor. Clearance work allegedly started before permission was obtained, and a road was unlawfully created through country park land. In Sai Kung West Country Park, about 100,000 sq ft of agricultural land in the abandoned village of Lai Chi Chong has been bought by a company allegedly controlled by a Heung Yee Kuk member.
The most likely plan for these and other rural sites is to get permission to build 'small houses'. In 1972, the government introduced a policy to allow every male indigenous villager to apply to build a 700 sq ft 'small house' on private or government land at a concessionary premium. The policy was originally conceived as a temporary measure to address housing needs but it was left opened-ended and has been causing a major planning headache for successive administrations. The application queue continues to grow, yet land availability is finite.
There was a chance to replace the small house policy prior to 1997 with the passage of the equal opportunity legislation. Since the law must apply equally to men and women, the small house policy, which only benefits men, would have to be scrapped or exempted. The political party, Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood, under the leadership of legislator Frederick Fung Kin-kee, bargained its way out of the dilemma.
In return for an assurance that the government would set up a special committee to look at replacing the small house policy, the party voted to exempt it to ensure its passage. The government did set up a committee but, by 2006, it announced defeat. The problem was 'too challenging'.
Successive administrations didn't want to change a poorly thought-out policy long past its usefulness. They couldn't find a way to deal with rural interests who stood to lose billions of dollars. In the meantime, proper planning and development are held hostage together with the wider public interests.
Christine Loh Kung-wai is chief executive of the think tank Civic Exchange
