John Lee is on right track with fix for housing

Chief executive hopeful John Lee Ka-chiu unveiled his election manifesto on April 29. After the social unrest and the Covid-19 pandemic, Hongkongers are earnestly looking forward to the next administration as a turning point.

While one cannot blame the events during the pandemic purely on the government, many mishaps could have been avoided or alleviated if fundamental planning and execution were effectively managed.

Over the years, housing has become a deep-rooted problem, depriving people of their right to live with a basic level of dignity.

As a working member of the building committee of the Housing Authority, I fully endorse the plans listed in Lee’s election manifesto as viable and practical: to explore the feasibility of a new Public Rental Housing Advance Allocation Scheme in select public rental housing projects as a shortterm relief measure, and to adopt innovative construction technologies, such as modular integrated construction (MiC) and building information modelling, more widely to reduce construction time.

The Housing Authority is already using MiC in some projects and in some instances, MiC has shortened building time by around 25 per cent. Higher costs, if any, in the range of about 5 per cent would be justifiable in light of the benefits – streamlining workflow and expediting job completion.

Lee has proposed setting up a Task Force on Public Housing Projects and a Steering Committee on Land and Housing Supply. Within the first 100 days of the new administration, the task force will submit a proposal to expedite building of public housing.

In past years, we have expended much energy on accommodating numerous “new normals”. Let’s now get ready to welcome a new chief executive who is accountable, dedicated, and willing to listen and respond.

Scarlett Pong Oi-lan, Sha Tin