published_or_final_version / Urban Planning / Master / Master of Science in Urban Planning

published_or_final_version / Politics and Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

Anti-social behaviour (AS B) in social housing is a major social concern. Because it destroys the living environment and ruins the quality of life, the need for intervention is never disputed. In the UK and Australia, strategies instituted against ASB are either prevention- or enforcement-focused. In Hong Kong, with the rapid development of the public rental housing (PRH) programme and the fast growth of PRH estates since 1953, pure reliance on the provisions of the tenancy agreement to arrest ASB has proved futile. Given the diverse backgrounds of the PRH tenants and the ever-surging PRH population, the Hong Kong Housing Authority seized the outbreak of SARS in 2003 as an opportune time to launch a new set of ASB control - the Marking Scheme (MS) - in the hope of improving the living environment and producing such social outcomes as civic responsibility and neighbourliness amongst its tenants. As a penalty-paint-driven system leading to tenancy termination, the MS is built on several key social-work and psychological concepts/theories including direct social control, broken window theory, conditioning and social learning, all aimed to induce behaviour change amongst the PRH residents. Notwithstanding the 10-year history of the MS, studies of this mode of ASB control mechanism are few. The handful of studies now available in the academia focuses only on the fairness, justifications and effectiveness of the MS. There is no study of whether it can bring about behaviour change. This research serves to fill the gap. By analyzing the survey results collected from a couple of young and old estates in a "City of Sadness" - Tin Shui Wai, it has found that the greatest impact of the MS on controlling ASB is its capability of inducing behaviour change. It is this capability that makes it tick. / published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

As at March of 2014, there are over 168 public housing estates and 766,300 public rental housing flats under the Hong Kong Housing Authority portfolio, it accommodating a total of more than two million people. The estate management and maintenance services are important for government to maintain social cohesion. Housing Department started to outsource property management of public rental housing to property services agents on 1 October 2000 by tender out. After 13 years run for the program, there are about 100 estates (60%) of public rental housing managed by property services agents. Recently, there is criticized that Housing Department outsource too many estates, it should be in-source the management back to itself. It is a chance to review the cost effectiveness and efficiency of outsourcing. This paper is trying to analyze and evaluate the outsourcing of property management of public rental housing in Hong Kong. A comparison on the services performance of public rental housing estates’ tenants by the property services agents and Housing Department. Also secondary data will be used to evaluate the cost effectiveness by outsource the estate management and maintenance services. The objective is achieved by using tenant’s survey. Result from this analysis show that the performance of property services agent provide a better services than Housing Department. It is no doubt that the performance of them is satisfactory and they are more cost effective. However, it does not imply that their services are far better than Housing Department, especially in repair and maintenance aspects. Recommendations are then made to help to review the problems of outsourcing and how to solve it. It is hope the finding can give the direction to Housing Department to use which management mode in new developed estate. / published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

Prior to 1985, individuals were generally not allowed to apply for public rental housing (PRH) on their own. In 1985, in order to response to the demand from the elderly and those affected by redevelopment or living in temporary housing areas, the restriction was released. The release of restriction attracts many one-person households to apply PRH. In 1989/90, applicants of age 18 to 24 occupied 4% of the newly registered Waiting List (WL) One-person Applications. But in 2004/05, the age group 18 to 24 applicants occupy 21% of the newly registered applications (Hong Kong Housing Authority, Housing Subsidised Committee SHC 58/2005, p.1 of Annex B). The Hong Kong Housing Authority found that the sharp increase number of Non-elderly One-person Applicants has adversely impacted to the 3 years rehousing performance pledge. It started to address the housing priority problem through the introduction of Quota and Points System (QPS) in September 2005. The Points System is based on two factors to assign points – the age of the applicant and whether the applicant is a PRH tenant or not. The priority of Non-elderly One-person WL applicants will be determined according to the points received. The more points the Applicant scores, the top priority and the earlier the Applicant will be offered a flat, subject to the fulfillment of all the other PRH eligibility criteria. Housing Authority sets an annual quota for Non-elderly One-person Applicants. This study aims at reviewing and evaluating the equitable issue of QPS. Equity is to ensure fairness of treatment between households. QPS is an important policy to rationalize housing priority to the Non-elderly One-person Applicants under scarce public housing resources. This study approaches the equity issue from both a theoretical analysis and a qualitative measurement by questionnaire survey. Based on various literature reviews, the concept of justice, equity, equality and housing needs are elaborated in theoretical analysis. Also, the experience of public housing application in some developed countries is described. The Points System of developed countries and Fordham’s suitability test are taken into account on setting of questionnaire. Most of the findings under theoretical analysis are agreed with the findings from the questionnaire survey. This study focuses on analysis in equity issue of QPS and to suggest recommendations to improve the equity among applicants. / published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

Similar to many other countries, in Hong Kong, housing has long been a very difficult issue to manage. It is also one of the pressing social issues that the government has to face with urgently and tactfully. Given by the exorbitant high property prices and landlords increase their properties rent in recent years, the current problem in Hong Kong is a great deal number of people, especially the young generation, cannot afford to buy home or even rent apartment in private property market. Thinking despairingly that home-owning is an unrealistic dream, most people applied for Public Rental Housing as their last resort to be housed. This sort of thinking is somewhat shown by the growing number of applicants in Waiting List for public rental housing flats. The growing number of applicants, by and large, indicating the demand of subsidized housing has never been subsided and also meant applicants need to wait much longer for allocation. Unfortunately, supply of flats has persistently fallen short of demand. There has been no adequate increase in subsidized flats’ supply in the past few years. The number of completed flats in 2012 is really not comparable with the number of applicants in the queue for public housing. Even, by adding the 15,000 new units each year as committed by the chief executive Mr. CY LEUNG, the public housing stock still cannot effectively satisfy the overwhelming demand of public rental housing. In view of the lack of supply of new flats, there has been demanded that the Government should act creatively to provide more flats to ensure quick allocation. Under this circumstance, the better utilization of existing PRH stock is becoming more essential and important. It is not hard to find from various sources that there are already many studies in evaluating the efficacy of the so called “well-off tenants policies”, such as the Housing Subsidy Policy, while little studies touch on the issue of under-occupation situation of public flats –an rather unfair phenomenon that the average living density of a household is more than allowed. Under-occupation policy is the policy implemented by the Housing Authority for maximizing the rational utilization of public housing resources so that larger subsidized flats can be recovered and reallocated to those in genuine needs and reducing unnecessary wastage of precious housing resources. In view of this, the dissertation is going to evaluate the effectiveness of the policy on under-occupation implemented by Housing Authority. In order to response the criticism on the equity and fairness towards the under-occupation issue, the dissertation is also written with an aim to evaluate these aspects and explores with objective assessment by adopting qualitative research methods, such as surveys and questionnaires. Questionnaires will be dispatched to residents in various housing estates to collect necessary information and opinions for analysis the equity and effectiveness of the policy. Hypothetical analysis and literature reviews will also be conducted through comparing different related official publications and journals. This dissertation is going to evaluate, based on empirical study and literature review, the implication and effectiveness of the policy adopted by Housing Authority to tackle on the problem of under-occupation of public rental housing flats and, with great ambition, make viable suggestions for the authority to cogitate and refine the performance of the policy. / published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

published_or_final_version / Housing Management / Master / Master of Housing Management

published_or_final_version / Economics / Master / Master of Philosophy