Decision to incorporate Sai Wan into country park was 'in public interest'

The rights of individual landowners did not outweigh the interests of the public, a judge ruled yesterday as he dismissed a Sai Kung villager's challenge to the policy of incorporating private land into country parks.

Court of First Instance judge Mr Justice Godfrey Lam Wan-ho refused to grant leave to Thomas Lai to seek a judicial review of the chief executive's decision to designate his home village of 60 years, Sai Wan Tsuen, as part of the Sai Kung East Country Park.

Lai had argued that the incorporation of Sai Wan, a coastal enclave, into the country park deprived villagers of their right to build houses on their land.

But Lam said the government drafted its land-use plans for country park enclaves in 2010 out of a commitment to protect the beauty and integrity of the parks.

"One is here concerned with land use and planning, where a decision can have a direct and substantial effect not only on the applicant but also the public," Lam wrote in his judgment. "The expectation of an individual or a group of individuals has to be balanced against the interests and needs of the public."

Lai argued that the authorities in the 1970s promised villagers their land would not be included in the country park. He also argued that incorporation would deprive indigenous villagers of their rights under the New Territories small-house policy, which grants men over 18 the right to apply to build three-storey homes on ancestral land.

Lai acknowledged filing the application five months after the chief executive's decision in May to incorporate the 17-hectare enclave into the park, breaking a three-month limit on judicial review applications.