A legislator who has demanded tighter checks on illegal guest houses had a shock when he learned that an unlicensed hostel was operating in a flat he owned.
A 1,200 sq ft flat owned and rented out by Paul Tse Wai-chun, the Legislative Council member for the tourism sector, and his wife Pamela Peck Wan-kam, a district councillor, is listed on the popular website Hostel World as a guest house called 'Pandora after 80s'.
Tse and Peck insisted they knew nothing about the flat in Causeway Bay being turned into a hostel and produced a contract stating that the flat, rented out for HK$29,800 a month, was strictly for residential use. The lease, agreed last October, runs to September 2014.
'I have so many flats. How do I know what people are doing in there?' an emotional Peck said. 'It's not possible for me to inspect them one by one like dissecting dead bodies. I'm not a detective.'
A legal letter would be sent to the tenants ordering them to stop any illegal activities, Tse said. They would be evicted if they refused to comply.
In 2009, after a fatal fire at a suspected illegal hostel in Tsim Sha Tsui, Tse called on the government to carry out more inspections, saying unlicensed guest houses were a safety risk and caused nuisance to their neighbours.
Young tourists seen leaving the Causeway Bay flat yesterday said they had checked in on the ninth floor and stayed either on the same floor or in another flat on the 11th floor.