Temporary housing scheme is about improving lives, not just numbers, says Hong Kong leader reacting to criticism
- Lawmakers have criticised the costs of building ‘light public housing’, which are higher than those of permanent public units
- To calculate if temporary housing is worth it one has to take hardships faced by low-income groups into account, says city leader John Lee
Hong Kong leader John Lee Ka-chiu has defended his new temporary housing scheme by saying that improving low-income groups’ quality of life is about more than just the numbers amid criticism of its high construction cost.
Lawmakers had earlier said “light public housing”, a new type of transitional homes, would be more expensive than permanent public flats, accusing authorities of not being transparent enough in providing the cost breakdown and design.
Lee said at a forum on Thursday that while he understood many people used different “mathematical formulas” to determine if the temporary flats were worth the money, such calculations did not take into account the “real hardships” that low-income groups faced daily.
“These cold figures have not considered their daily hardships of eating right outside the bathroom, having no separate toilet and kitchen, living with woodlice and cockroaches, while children have never sat on a sofa and don’t have a table at which to do their homework,” Lee told the audience at the economic forum.
He said if residents were the ones doing the calculation, he believed they would factor in their adversities, calling that “an experience of flesh and blood”.
“They are not bystanders, and might not agree with these ‘cold figures’,” he added.
The government had been spending more than HK$100 billion (US$12.8 billion) each year on social welfare to help residents improve their lives, he said, arguing this was the “poverty equation” that light public housing would solve.
The Housing Bureau is hoping to secure a HK$32 billion lump sum for 30,000 transitional homes from the legislature in the first quarter of next year, an amount which includes a HK$26.8 billion design and construction fee, meaning that each unit would cost around HK$900,000.
Housing minister Winnie Ho Wing-yin, in an explanation to lawmakers, said earlier that building the temporary structures would cost HK$20 billion. Buildings with 16 to 18 floors would cost HK$680,000 per unit, similar to the HK$650,000 cost of a permanent public home.
She added that flats in low-rise blocks would cost HK$550,000 per unit, which was similar to the cost of transitional flats built by welfare groups.
‘Some temporary public flats could cost more to build than permanent homes’
Echoing Ho’s argument, the city leader on Thursday said it would cost more to build temporary blocks with more than 10 floors because they would require lifts and drilling for the foundations.
“What do these light public housing flats represent? They represent standing together with the low-income families, the breakthrough mindset to solve the problem of a difficult living environment … offering residents a choice they didn’t have before,” Lee said.
According to his maiden policy address in October, the government aims to reduce the waiting time for both permanent and temporary public flats to 4½ years by the 2026-27 financial year with 30,000 temporary homes built in five years. The wait for a permanent public rental flat is currently 5.6 years.
But Caesar Choi Lok-ching, a land policy researcher at Liber Research Community, remained unconvinced.
Hong Kong unveils sites for ‘light public housing’ scheme for temporary homes
“It is not proper that the government works out a policy without considering cost effectiveness. We cannot just say it is a good policy and we will do it at any cost,” Choi said.
He added that the current sites proposed by the government were mainly in rural areas where there was a lack of community facilities and public transport. He questioned whether low-income groups would be able to improve their lives in those areas.
Lawmaker Vincent Cheng Wing-shun, who recently raised concerns about the hefty price tag at a Legislative Council housing panel meeting, said he hoped the government would explore ways to cut the cost.
“I support the building of ‘light public housing’ to ease the plight of those living in subdivided flats while waiting for a public unit. I also agree with the chief executive that we need to build it quickly,” Cheng said.
Average waiting time for public rental flat in Hong Kong drops to 5.6 years
“We hope the government can provide more details or breakdowns about how the money is to be used. We also hope the government can look into ways to cut the cost.”
Lawmaker and surveyor Tony Tse Wai-chuen who had earlier opposed the lump-sum grant arrangement said he had no intention of delaying the projects but stressed that a balance had to be struck between time and cost-effectiveness.
He said he hoped the government would explain to the public why it had to build costly temporary homes rather than permanent ones.
