Covid Cases Continue to Rise

Some of the isolation units will be in these housing blocks

Today over 17,000 positive cases were reported, and 66 deaths.

According to Bloomberg, Hong Kong is now the second worst city in the world to be in now (the worst is Pakistan), in terms of how the place is dealing with Covid-19, its healthcare services and facilities, vaccines and so forth.

Hong Kong has plunged in the resilience score

How did the city drop so low? 

Ask Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor.

Her Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee continues to repeat the mantra that the fifth wave is "unprecedented" and that it hasn't peaked yet.

"We must use the coming two to three months to curb the pandemic with several measures," she said today.

As hospitals are now overstretched, any patient considered stable will be moved to isolation facilities or their homes as long as they had a negative test by the 14th day.

The only bright spot is that those who are fully vaccinated can end their isolation period if they test negative after the sixth or seventh day.

"We need to make sure resources are allocated to those who are most in need," Chan said.

You don't say!

Some temporary isolation facilities 

So many people on social media have suggested that only those who are in dire need of medical help should go to the hospital -- those who test positive but have no major symptoms should just isolate at home. But Hong Kong refuses this idea, as it continues to follow its goal of "dynamic zero Covid".

It's amusing to see government officials running around like chickens with their heads cut off.

Secretary for Housing and Transport Frank Chan Fan and his department are preparing some 3,000 flats in just completed housing estates to be temporary isolation units and described the logistics involved.

He said more than 16,000 light bulbs, 10,000 bed sheets, 3,000 electric appliances and other furniture items had to be procured, delivered and installed in all units on different levels within a short time.

They will have to keep working harder -- some 88,000 community isolation units for people with mild or no symptoms need to be ready in the next few months.

Inspection of the Lok Ma Chau Loop site

And at Lok Ma Chau Loop a temporary hospital is being built to house 816 beds. 

Hope they are building enough to house everyone! There is video footage of an unnamed hospital with patients placed in a hallway. It's devastating. Even more devastating is that so many are unvaccinated...

Government Sets Minimum Size for Flats

Wong sets minimum size for flats on govt land to 280 sq ft

Finally the Hong Kong government has decided to take a stand and determine the minimum size of a flat.

Secretary for Development Michael Wong Wai-lun has determined that flats on government land can be no smaller than 280 square feet. We're assuming this is the amount of actual living space in the flat and not including public areas...

There are still lots of nano flats on the market

When asked why 280 sq ft was chosen, Wong said another subsidised project at Anderson Road in Kwun Tong had a minimum size limit of 250 sq ft that was used as a reference point. As the Tuen Mun parcel is a private piece of land, that is one step higher on the housing ladder (than one on government land), so the threshold was taken to 10 percent higher.

Government officials are not actually looking at the size of flats and saying, "This looks liveable to me,", but rather "What's the going rate now?" which is not how to solve the city's housing woes.

Have these senior ministers actually walked inside a 250 sq ft or 280 sq ft flat and asked themselves if they could actually live in there with all their stuff?

Apparently this is not how they do things.

"Now that we have set the rules of the game clearly, [developers] will not need to worry about their peers benefiting from a layout with very small units," Wong said. "We think it is a level playing field. It is a very fair-game rule."

How about a flat almost twice the size of this?

For the developers yes, but not the buyers, many of them young people trying to get onto the housing ladder.

Wong was not worried about the establishment of the minimum size affecting home-buying options as there were still plenty of flats measuring smaller than 300 sq ft.

The question now is what will happen to the values of the flats that are smaller than 280 sq ft? Will they be less valued because they don't make the grade anymore?

Hopefully with the minimum space determined, then we will see the end of nano flats, those smaller than 200 sq ft, though some real estate experts say the 280 sq ft will price many out of the market. 

A never-ending vicious circle...

Tiniest Subsidised Flats for Sale

The subsidised flats occupy the former airport at Kai Tak

The Hong Kong Housing Authority's mandate is to provide affordable rental housing to low-income families with housing needs, and to help low- to middle-income families gain access to subsidised home ownership.

That's what it says in its website.

However next year's batch of subsidised homes the authority will sell will be as small as 186 square feet -- the equivalent of one and a half car parking spaces, the tiniest flats to be offered since the start of the Home Ownership Scheme in 1978.

The smallest flats will be 186 sq ft

The 320 small units are on the site of the former airport at Kai Tak, among the 8,925 subsidised flats to be for sale in the first quarter of next year.

About 30 percent of the new batch are smaller than 322 sq ft. Such flats are increasingly making up a bigger portion of the authority's supply, accounting for 22 percent in 2020, and 15 percent in 2019.

Francis Lam Ka-fai, vice-president of the Institute of Surveyors and its spokesman on housing policy said that while he supported the 49 percent discounts on the units, he slammed the micro-flats on offer, saying they had "become a joke".

"That's really undesirable. Why did [the authority] go for such small units? I don't know what their rationale is," he said. "In terms of the design, [anything] less than 200 sq ft is really undesirable for anybody." 

We fully agree.

The tiny flats may look like this. Appealing to you?

And to even qualify for this scheme, a single person can have a monthly salary of no more than HK$34,730 and assets worth no more than HK$925,000, while for households of two or more people, they must earn no more than $69,740 and own assets worth less than HK$1.85 million.

Who wants to live in 186 sq ft discounted HK$1.24 million (US$158,900)? What can you even fit in there? Can someone really live happily in such a tiny place? And they would have to live in it for 15 years before being allowed to sell it. 

If the government wants to encourage a higher birthrate, it really needs to build bigger subsidised flats to start with. How can one even get married let alone have children in 186 sq ft? Have these housing officials even seen how tiny that space is? 

It boggles the mind...

No Chance for Second Lucky Draw

A lucky vaccinated person won a flat here, but no second draw

Remember lucky draws? Those prizes that were meant to entice people to get vaccinated?

Sino Group and its philanthropic arm the Ng Teng Fong Charitable Foundation Limited, as well as Chinese Estates Holdings already gave away a HK$10 million flat in Kwun Tong earlier as well as cash prizes.

They promised to give away another flat if a total of 5 million people got at least one jab by the end of November, but today being November 30, that did not happen.

Today's notice says less than 5M have one jab

As of today, the total is 4,756,146. Where are the other 243,854 people who have not gotten vaccinated?! Why are they denying people like me the chance to win a flat?!

Joking aside I don't expect to win a flat, but I had hoped people would be selfless and get the jab not only for their own safety but also for the safety of others.

But I was wrong -- people in Hong Kong really are selfish and are willing to drag the rest of us with them into having zero benefits of being vaccinated.

Nevertheless, Executive Council member Bernard Chan has hinted that the elderly will need to get the jab eventually.

He said the city cannot allow the vaccination rate among elderly people to remain at 20 percent, as currently just under 19 percent of people over the age of 80 have had one dose.

Chan warned if the inoculation rate does not go up, Hong Kong will never be able to open its borders to the world.

"If in the future, we have more premises that adopt 'vaccine bubbles' that require people to get jabbed to enter, I believe at the end of the day elderly people will get the shots," he said.

Chan says HK cannot be isolated much longer

"They simply lack the motivation now. If we wait for them they may never get vaccinated. If they don't, Hong Kong's 7.4 million people will be isolated."

Excuse me? We have been isolated for almost two years. 

And now with the Omicron variant, it is even more imperative that the elderly get jabbed.

The government seems to have no problem cracking down on people who allegedly violate the national security law, but when it comes to getting the elderly vaccinated, it's a wait-and-see approach that is going no where...

Buy a Nano Flat with a "Garden"

Ground floor hard to sell so developers lure buyers with patios

In North America, some people are moving away from the downtown core, or central business district and getting larger homes in the suburbs where they can have more space.

Try doing the same kind of thing in Hong Kong and you'd need to be a zillionaire.

#Lyos in Hung Shui Kiu has patios with nano flats

But there's there's private developers designing nano flats -- with patios.

#Lyos, a project in Hung Shui Kiu in the New Territories developed by CK Asset Holdings, 58 ground-floor flats, mostly studios and one-bedroom units -- come with a patio, which is not included in the saleable area of homes.

The nano flats have what are described as private gardens between 53 and 295 sq ft.

Of the 341 flats in #Lyos, 184 of them range between 202 and 292 sq ft. The project will be completed two years from now.

An example of a nano flat layout for one person

All 40 of the ground floor nano flats that came with gardens -- actually patios -- were snapped up with in a day when they opened for sale in two batches earlier this month.

A 217 sq ft studio with a 201 sq ft patio costs about HK$4.7 million (US$603,000), or HK$21,645 per sq ft, whereas a 206 sq ft flat one floor up costs HK$4.14 million or HK$20,073 per sq ft.

But perhaps this is the developer's way of selling ground floor flats, as they are usually harder to sell --  why not design a larger liveable space than a nano flat with "a garden"? How is that more liveable? It's jus absurd.

But alas the Hong Kong government doesn't seem to think it's necessary to rein in developers with their misleading marketing language to lure buyers in.

Manor Hill promises a "staycation" experience

One housing development called Manor Hill by Kowloon Development in Tseung Kwan O, studios and one-bedroom flats ranging from 203 to 300 sq ft make up about 90 percent of the 1,556 homes in two towers.

The average price is HK$20,921 per sq ft, making it the most expensive new launch at Lohas Park, Hong Kong's largest private housing project.

The developer said the clubhouse and garden, which covered 49,000 sq ft, provided facilities "comparable to five-star hotels", giving residents a "staycation-like" experience.

Seriously?

This is why people do staycations in the first place -- their flats are tinier than hotel rooms.

Living in a nano flat is definitely not comparable to five-star hotels. You don't have a butler waiting on you, and your food is prepared by a microwave because there's no room for a stove.

How does nano flat compare to Rosewood?

The government plans to pass a law to prosecute for "fake news". How about "fake descriptions"?

It's making a joke out of young people desperate to climb the property ladder...

Fact of the Day: Over Five-Year Wait for Public Housing

Lam suggested the Housing Authority build flats faster

Why do low-income residents have to wait an average of 5.8 years for public housing in Hong Kong?

How could this problem not be tackled effectively by each successive Chief Executive and now the wait time is the longest it has been in more than 20 years?

In addition, Beijing is getting impatient and demanding this problem, and including that of notorious caged homes be solved in the next few years.

Lam wants to develop this land into new CBD

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor has suggested developing New Territories North to build not only housing but also create the new CBD near the border with Shenzhen. If this area is to be the new "Central district", will low-income earners be able to afford a flat where the new Landmark will be?

On Sunday she tried to shift the blame on the Housing Authority, which is a government agency, saying the government hands out cash subsidies to those who have been waiting for low-income housing for more than three years. 

"The cash subsidies are currently paid by the government, but why shouldn't they be [paid by] the Housing Authority? If you build the estates slowly, you will have to pay [more].

"I hope that they will be motivated to build them faster, at least one or two months quicker.

"Establishing a more substantial sense of accountability is an important part of improving governance."

She also suggested they could use prefabricated materials to build the flats faster.

No sooner had Lam said this did she rile up the Housing Authority, which in turn blamed the government for the shortage of suitable land.

Beijing wants cage home problem solved asap

Raymond Chan Yuk-ming, a member of the authority's building committee, told a radio program earlier in the day that land handed over to the statutory body was little more than "pig skulls" -- a Cantonese expression for unwanted cast-offs -- adding the body was forced to "accept them with tears".

He also went on that officials were forced to "spend a lot of time" responding to neighbourhood concerns about public flats being built on cramped or ecologically sensitive sites.

The claws are out.

To do some damage control, Lam blamed the media (how convenient) for creating quarrels, and that disputes were not constructive. 

Then she went on to praise the authority for building 96,500 new flats in the past four years -- a 50 percent increase from the previous five-year period.

Would a Chief Executive backpedal if she were not going to run again?

In the meantime we're back where we started. 

Again why is it that low-income residents must wait an average of 5.8 years for public housing in Hong Kong?

 

Lam's Plan to Develop New Territories North into Metropolis

Lam enters Legislative Council to deliver her policy address

 

Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor has revealed her ambitious plan to tackle housing -- develop New Territories North, the area close to the border with Shenzhen. That will mean the rapid development (and gentrification) or districts like Tin Shui Wai, Yuen Long, Fanling and Sheung Shui. 

That will mean having to deal with the thorny issue of indigenous villagers having those small three-storey houses dotted all over the New Territories, and developing brown sites that are covered with shipping containers.

Across the border is developed Shenzhen

By combining the above mentioned districts together and developing the area could yield 515,000 new residential flats and become a crucial link with the Greater Bay Area.

"With as many as seven land-based boundary control points, the Northern Metropolis will be the most important area in Hong Kong that facilitates our development integration with Shenzhen and connection with the Greater Bay Area," she said during her policy address today.

"Such an integration can create the development capacity to meet the needs of our economy and people's livelihoods, and a quality environment for sustainable development," Lam said. "All these will help us better respond to the new opportunities brought about by deepened cooperation between Hong Kong and Shenzhen."

Time to tackle indigenous villager houses

Lam is still pitching her "Lantau Tomorrow Vision" of building an entire island from scratch off of Lantau, but the Northern Metropolis makes more sense and would be less ecologically damaging.

However, will the market worry about property prices falling? There are rumours house prices will drop this month following Lam's announcement. 

But those owning land in Tin Shui Wai, Yuen Long, Fanling and Sheung Shui will be raking it in as their property will be demand. 

 

Buyers Battle Out for Flats Under HK$5M

The Met.Azure has a "sea view", and 25 minutes from MTR

 

It's quite incredible that despite the coronavirus pandemic that caused lots of people to lose jobs or businesses went belly up that the Hong Kong real estate market continues to be red hot.

The project features nano flats less than 300 sq ft

This weekend developer Wang On sold out all 143 flats at its The Met.Azure project in Tsing Yi, with 13 buyers for every available flat that is not that convenient -- a 25-minute walk to the Tsing Yi MTR station. The project, which will be scheduled to be completed by December 2022, has micro flats ranging from 181 sq ft to 257 sq ft, with prices from HK$3.89 million to HK$4.61 million respectively, an average of HK$20,638 per square foot. 

The flats are aimed at first-time buyers, who can get up to 90 percent mortgage financing.

"There is strong demand for this type of flats, which allow [first-time buyers] the chance to enter the market with budgets of less than HK$5 million," said Midland Realty's residential division chief executive Sammy Po. "There's even full sea view" from the flats, he said. 

How does one squeeze into a flat less than 300 square feet? The bed is hoisted up like a bunk bed to give the impression of more space. Creative, but definitely aimed at buyers in their 20s and 30s.

Bedrooms are bunk beds, above living space

Nevertheless, analysts believe that with the pandemic under control in the city, and unemployment rates going down, people feel more confident in investing in a home -- despite almost 90,000 people left in the past year.

Maybe they are taking advantage of people leaving, as some 10,000 homes were sold this year, up 20 percent this year.

The Housing Affordability Index climbed to 75 percent in the second quarter, way above the 20-year average of 47 percent. This means home prices are still losing touch with economic fundamentals and residents' affordability. 

It's also quite amazing young people are prepared to spend the next 20, 30 years paying off for these nano flats in a bid to get up the housing ladder... in less than 10 years will the average price be HK$30,000 per square foot?

Lam Hits Out at Leung's Housing Plan

Lam (centre) was on a radio show today blasting Leung's plan

The knives are out between former chief executive Leung Chun-ying and incumbent Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor.

Leung, a vice chairman of the Chinese People's Consultative Conference, recently re-pitched his idea of building flats on the edge of country parks much to the horror of environmentalists, but to be honest, her idea of building a series of giant artificial islands attached to Lantau is just as terrifying.

Will Leung and Lam battle for the CE job?

On a radio show today, Lam took a shot at Leung, saying if his idea of building those flats was so good, it would have been done long ago. She said the government has strong reservations about such a "controversial proposal".

"Frankly, if developing the edges of country parts is so attractive and easy, the government would've done it long ago. The last administration wouldn't have waited until the final months of its term to bring up the idea," she said.

"I was already away from the government at the time, I had resigned [to run for CE]."

She said developing the peripheries of country parks would take quite some time, so her administration has gone with other options.

Lantau Tomorrow Vision is environmental crisis

Like her Lantau Tomorrow Vision is a better idea?

The plan is to construct artificial islands that will create 1,700 hectares of land through massive reclamation and is expected to cost HK$500 billion (US$63.8 billion) -- amounting to half the government's coffers and serious environmental concerns.

Both Leung and Lam have terrible ideas of how to create more land for housing when they have not even exhausted other possibilities for land redevelopment such as brown sites dotted all over the city. While they are not giant swathes of land, they are empty or vacant nonetheless and why not use them?

Unsound Towers to be Knocked Down, Rebuilt

This is the idyllic marketing image of The Pavilia Farm III

On June 20, 169 out of 173 units at The Pavilia Farm III located above Tai Wai MTR station were snapped up. A record 30,500 prospective buyers came with the hopes of snapping up one of the flats, the ratio being one flat for every 176 buyers.

The average price per square foot was HK$24,858 or US$3,850.

The blocks circled in red will be demolished

But maybe those who lost out on the chance to buy are now breathing a sigh of relief.

It turns out now that two of the buildings, half finished at The Pavilia Farm III, did not meet the concrete strength tests and must be demolished and rebuilt.

The concrete walls in the podium of blocks 1 and 8 of The Pavilia Farm III "did not meet the requirements of the approved design" found during concrete strength tests, according to a statement by the subway contractor MTR Corporation, which is developing the project with New World Development.

The unprecedented setback in the world's most expensive property market will affect 846 buyers.

Buyers had snapped up almost all flats in one day

"A demolition of such a scale is unheard of," said Tony Tse, who represents the architectural, surveying, planning and landscape constituencies in Hong Kong's legislature. Cases of minor structural weakness due to bad workmanship is possible, but the current case is unprecedented, he said.

It turns out a subcontractor used the wrong grade of concrete for the walls, making them weaker.

The setback will result in a nine-month delay in getting the new flats to March 2024. The developers will offer two compensation options for affected buyers. Those who have begun paying mortgages can get up to 7.6 percent of their purchase price, while those who choose to back out will received HK$310,000 inclusive of rental subsidy and interest compensation.

The development is located above Tai Wai MTR

It is quite shocking that a reputable developer would make such a costly mistake. While it is lucky New World Development were honest about the mistake, heads are definitely going to roll for this one...

Get Jabbed for a Chance to Win a Flat

A flat like this could be yours if you get your two vaccinations

Finally the numbers of people signing up to get vaccinations surged to 28,200 today, 10,500 for Sinovac, 17,700 for BioNTech.

The reason?

The chance to win a HK$10.8 million flat, and some other monetary prizes.

Enter the lucky draw to win a flat in Kwun Tong

Yesterday a group of companies: The Sino Group, Ng Teng Fong Charitable Foundation, and Chinese Estate Holdings announced they were sponsoring a lucky draw for a one-bedroom flat measuring 449 sq ft in Kwun Tong. But that's not all -- they will also donate 20 prizes with prepaid or credit card value of HK$100,000 each.

They heeded Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor's call for companies to give out financial incentives to get the public to get jabs, as she didn't think it was the government's job to do that.

Huh.  

But at least this announcement worked so far. If there wasn't much of a response then it showed even money wouldn't move Hongkongers to roll up their sleeves and protect themselves and others.

However others still refuse to budge with the same reasons, that they were scared of the side effects, that the vaccines were rushed out too clearly and wanted more proof they were effective, or claimed their doctors advised them against it.

Chan says HK may not order more vaccines

But Secretary for Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee warned if more people didn't take up the vaccine, then it would be hard for Hong Kong to justify ordering more, considering others places were desperate for vaccines. 

She added when the time came for booster shots, those who hadn't had two shots yet would not be eligible.

Meanwhile the University of Hong Kong infectious disease expert Yuen Kwok-yung believed the fourth wave was over in the city with zero local infections for 28 days, but warned the fifth wave could be coming.

What?!

He said it was tricky to decide on whether to lift social-distancing measures, like limits on the number of people per group, and mandatory mask-wearing in public areas. Yuen said the focus should not be on easing restrictions, but on preparing for the fifth wave.

Yuen has tough suggestions for those not jabbed

However, Yuen recommended some benefits to those who had been vaccinated. For example they should be allowed to stay in restaurants until midnight, while those who haven't had the jab should only be allowed to eat at lunch time in restaurants, and outdoors at other times. 

If a building has a transmission of the virus and requires evacuation, those who are inoculated should be allowed to quarantine at home, while those who are not must do the 21 days in a government quarantine camp. 

And once adolescents are allowed to get the jab, then those should be allowed to be in the classroom, while those who haven't been inoculated must study from home.

Sounds harsh, but definitely an incentive to get the vaccine.

Carrie, any thoughts?

Lam's Policy Address was a Doozy

Lam makes her policy address and note the Chinese lapel pin

The long-awaited policy address by Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor was finally given, and clocked in at a very long two hours and 15 minutes, tying with her predecessor Leung Chun-ying. Lam read out some 30,000 words and claimed she had written the entire thing herself. 

She read out her speech to a Legislature Council that only made up of the pro-establishment lawmakers and two independents after four pan-democrat lawmakers were ousted and their 15 colleagues resigned in protest a few weeks ago.

Cheung gets hair crabs, Ip sees Tsang sleeping

Lam claimed to be pleased she could read out her speech in a peaceful chambers, as last year she received so much heckling that she retreated from Legco and gave a pre-recorded video address instead.

Maybe that's because some people in the room were busy doing other things -- like Secretary for Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Erick Tsang Kwok-wai was caught dozing off as well as Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan Siu-chee. 

Meanwhile the portly Business and Professionals Alliance lawmaker Christopher Cheung Wah-fung received a message on his phone that his order of hairy crabs worth HK$9,600 was ready to be picked up and would he be paying by cheque or cash?

Then there was the Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong's Vincent Cheng Wing-shun spending the time trying to twirl a pen on his hand, while New People's Party's Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee looked at pictures of Tsang sleeping on her Whatsapp.

Did Lam reprimand them for not paying attention to her piece de resistance?

What lawmakers did listening to Lam's speech

In any event, at least the media were glued to their screens watching the proceedings. 

Lam started the speech by saying the objective of the policy address was to "find a way out of the impasse" and restore people's confidence following the anti-government protests last year, and the current battle against the coronavirus pandemic, which has caused the economy to shrink by 6.1 percent.

The national security law enacted on June 30, Lam said, helped Hong Kong become peaceful again and restored stability in the city. But she said more needs to be done in educating people, particularly the youth about the law, and this will be a 10-year project launched by the Department of Justice. Lawmakers, judges and civil servants will have to pledge allegiance to the city and the Basic Law.

Reporters made note of Lam wearing a pin of the Chinese flag on her lapel, signalling things are becoming more mainlandized. Hong Kong will be dragged closer to the mainland with the Greater Bay Area as the priority, and the city together with Macau and Guangdong will become an economic powerhouse -- at least in theory.

Some 2,000 university graduates from Hong Kong who are willing to go work in the mainland will have their monthly salary of HK$18,000 (US$2,322) paid for by taxpayers. Will that actually tempt them to go to the dark side? Or will they worry they will be branded as traitors?

Is it realistic to invest in Zhuhai Airport?

Lam also said the Airport Authority Hong Kong will invest in more shares in Zhuhai Airport for domestic travel, but when looked at realistically, it is 90km away and there is currently no logistical connection between it and Hong Kong. 

To boost the economy in the short term, stamp duties on commercial real estate transactions will be suspended, but that perhaps will make the rich richer and the rest of us left further behind. Lam said with the GBA project, Hong Kong could act as a middleman between China and the rest of the world... hasn't it been doing that since the 1800s? And has Hong Kong been reduced to the role of facilitator and not a leading city in Asia? 

When it comes to fighting the pandemic, Lam says Hong Kong has ordered vaccines, but if there aren't enough, the mainland has earmarked some for us. However she had no further details on the manufacturer or how effective they were. How reassuring.

During her visit to Beijing she pitched the idea of opening the border with the mainland, but she was rebuffed because Hong Kong's case numbers are still high (this was before the current fourth wave). 

Hong Kong needs to reach zero infections

As a result, Lam says a community-wide testing program may need to happen again, and reiterated people need to be more careful about going out unnecessarily as she is pushing for zero infections. Lam later admitted in the press conference it may be impossible to get completely down to zero, but that it was something to aim for. Don't we all, Carrie?

Finally the chief executive talked about more housing, and that the government had identified 330 hectares of land to build 316,000 public housing units in the next 10 years. And she is still pushing her ambitious Lantau Tomorrow Vision of reclaiming 1,000 hectares of land to build more housing at the price tag of HK$624 billion. 

Critics not only say this drains at least half of the government coffers, but also the environmental damage will be irreparable. When asked again about it by the media, Lam shot back that only HK$550 million would be spent on a study, but in reality with no viable opposition, the project will go ahead eventually. 

So that in a nutshell is the policy address today.

But we really wonder if Christopher Cheung enjoyed his hairy crabs today.

 

Pan-Democrats Play into Beijing's Hands

Pan-democrats are united, but are they doing the right thing?

 

The pan-democratic lawmakers in the Legislative Council are outnumbered by the pro-establishment politicians, so when bills need to be passed, the former use whatever tools they have to prevent or at least have a decent debate before it is basically rubber stamped.

One of the tools they use is filibustering, and every other democratic opposition uses this strategy at one time or another.

For the Hong Kong opposition, it's basically all they have left. They don't even have a chance of having a majority elected in Legco and Beijing wants to make sure it stays that way.

Baggio Leung crosses his fingers in swearing-in

In recent years the National People's Congress has decimated the opposition by disqualifying them. In 2016, six newly-elected pan-democrats, including Nathan Law Kwun-chung, Yau Wai-ching and Sixtus Baggio Leung Chung-hang were disqualified for displaying a banner that said "Hong Kong is not China" and not taking their oath seriously, mispronouncing "People's Republic of China" as "people's re-f***ing of Chee-na".

Now four more pan-democrat lawmakers may also be disqualified for... filibustering.

The NPC is meeting this week and has this issue on its agenda. 

The warning came from Tam Yiu-chung, Hong Kong's only delegate to the standing committee, saying the lawmakers' delaying tactics since the beginning of Legco's extended term made them unsuitable for office.

"As lawmakers, you must act in accordance with Article 104 of the Basic Law, [which states that lawmakers] need to swear allegiance to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and uphold the Basic Law," he said before flying to Beijing.

Tam says bills need to be passed, not filibustering

"It isn't good to use various means to disrupt Legco's normal operation. We need to face this problem."

The four at risk of being thrown out of Legco are: Civic Party's Alvin Yeung Ngok-kiu, Dennis Kwok and Kwok Ka-ki, and Kenneth Leung of the Professionals Guild.

This evening 19 pan-democrats decided to raise the stakes if the four are disqualified.

"We have decided that we will resign en masse without hesitation if the central government decides to push ahead with the disqualification," Democratic Party chairman Wu Chi-wai, co-convenor of the pan-democrat bloc said during a hastily arranged press conference.

"It is to demonstrate our extreme discontent and strong protest against the authorities' ruthless attempt to trample the legislature."

But isn't that exactly falling into Beijing's hands? If they all resign, there will be no opposition in Legco, and the people who elected them in are powerless to oppose this, as public protests are practically impossible now due to the pandemic.  

Beijing wants antics like this to end in Legco

Is this the right course of action for the pan-democrats to take? While filibustering is allowed in Legco, Beijing has had enough of it and wants bills to be passed.

Some don't deserve to be passed, such as the Lantau Tomorrow Vision, where Chief Executive Carrie Lam proposes to solve the housing crisis by building a massive 1,700-hectare manmade island through land reclamation costing HK$500 million (US$68.3 billion) off Lantau.

We will find out in the next day or so what Beijing has to say about the four lawmakers; it may force the hand of pan-democrats to resign en masse. 

Then what? 

Who will represent the interests of Hongkongers?

Liaison Office's Massive Property Porfolio in HK

The liaison office, through a company, owns over 700 properties in Hong Kong

Through a shell company, Bejiing owns a lot of property in Hong Kong. Even better it didn't have to pay any stamp duties on the staggering 757 residences, offices, car parks and entire buildings as of February last year.

The political party Demosisto, led by Joshua Wong Chi-fung released the findings today, which are staggering to say the least.

Joshua Wong of Demosisto released the findings today

The report says the company, called Newman Investment Company Limited, which was set up in 1972, bought 400 residences before the handover in 1997, about 180 between 1998 and 2014, and then another 130 between 2014 and last year. The total value is estimated at HK$3.4 billion.

Previously local media had estimated the company, whose five directors appear to have the same names as officials in the liaison office, had a portfolio of between 300 to 500 properties. This was obviously grossly underestimated.

Wong says the increased number of flats in the last few years shows Beijing is increasing its reach in Hong Kong.

"Beijing has scaled up its property empire after the 'umbrella movement' in 2014, reaching out its tentacles from Hong Kong Island to other places in the city," Wong said, referring to the large-scale civil disobedience movement that blocked part of the city for 79 days over universal suffrage.

He said Demosisto would submit these findings to the US Department of State, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, and Britain's All-Party Parliamentary Group Hong Kong.

However, pro-establishment lawmaker Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, chairwoman of the New People's Party, said she believed most of the residences were for housing liaison office employees.

Regina Ip says the flats are used to house liaison office staff

"When rents are so expensive in Hong Kong, I don't see any problem for the liaison office to purchase flats for its employees to live in," she said. "It might have bought more units in recent years, as it expected to become more and more costly."

We all know housing is expensive in Hong Kong, but they snapped up over 700 properties, not all of them flats. So how many people work in the liaison office, and do they actually live in these flats? What about the offices and entire buildings? What are those used for?

Demosisto estimates at least 722 staff work in the liaison office. What do they all do?

Perhaps even better, this company, because of its links with the liaison office, does not need to pay HK$124 million in stamp duty over the past five years of property purchases.

According to the Stamp Duty Ordinance, the central government, or any "incorporated public officer or any person acting in his capacity has a public officer shall not be liable for the payment of stamp duty".

The company bought 20 flats at Grand Central last year

Seems like this ordinance was specifically written to benefit a particular company...

Last February, a local newspaper reported the liaison office had paid HK$247.5 million, through Newman Investment, for 20 flats at Grand Central complex in Kwun Tong, according to the Land Registry. The office later insisted the properties were used as staff quarters, and denied suggestions it had intended to resell them for a quick profit.

While many of these properties may be "housing", they still are a good investment...