Housing tops lawmakers’ concerns during Q&A with Chui

Chui Sai On answers lawmakers’ questions

Housing has probably been the most recurrent topic at the plenary sessions of the Legislative Assembly (AL), and last Friday was no exception.
While answering questions from lawmakers, the Chief Executive (CE) elaborated on issues raised by the latest Policy Address. The housing topic was pulled out right at the start by lawmaker Chan Meng Kam, who questioned the CE about the tender process for the public housing schemes, as well as concerns over the quality of current construction projects. “In Macau, there is an absurd phenomenon, there are ‘people without homes and homes without people,’” he stated, blaming low quality construction as a major factor.
Chui Sai On replied by saying that “in the construction of the residential units the quality may not be as bad as we think. Sometimes in the private market, we also notice similar situations.” He said that the government hopes for “tolerance and understanding” from people, and claimed that all problems reported by citizens will be fixed.
The CE also promised lawmakers that the government would resolve the issue of the 1,900 families who were selected to receive public housing during the previous tender “within this year.”
“The high prices of real estate, which remain high in spite of falling 20 to 30 percent last year, are a major concern [for the government],” the CE said, adding that market prices are still “out of reach for a middle class couple.”
But it is not only the general population who are asking for housing, recalled lawmaker Song Pek Kei. Public servants are another group affected by this problem, and Song called the attention of the CE to the “unfair situation” related to the current tender process for the attribution of government houses to public sector workers.
The law, she said, “requires public servants to be permanent career workers” which she claims excludes about 60 percent of the current staff working in the  service.
The leader of the government agreed with Song’s claim and said that he would craft a bill immediately for the revision of that law.
The CE took the opportunity to remind lawmakers of the importance given by the government to the region’s public servants, saying that this justified the two tenders for government houses, in 2012 and now in 2016. The tenders had aimed to provide 220 and 110 new apartments, respectively, together with the updates made to the housing subsidy in 2011 and again in 2014. The CE concluded by promising to address this topic again as soon as the government manages to secure more plots of land, since it is “a priority.”
Au Kam San was another of the lawmakers to address this topic, expressing his disagreement with a high ranked official who allegedly said recently that “if Macau builds all the public houses that the government has planned, these houses will be around 30 percent of the market and that is too much.”
Au gave the example of the neighboring region of Hong Kong, where public housing makes up approximately 50 percent of the market, stating that “nobody thinks that is too much there.”
Chui Sai On also said that the government would launch a public consultation on Macau’s first five-year plan (2016-2020) tomorrow. The plan’s draft, which is over 37,000 characters long, will be released to the public for their suggestions. It has been made on the basis of the preliminary five-year plan that was unveiled in November 2015, which aims to turn Macau into a world tourism and leisure hub by the mid 2030s.   According to Xinhua, the preliminary plan sets out seven major targets, including maintaining stable economic growth, improving the structure of industries, improving Macau’s role as an international tourist city, raising the quality of life of residents and the quality of education, protecting the environment, strengthening the efficiency of the government, and consolidating the development of the legal system.
The preliminary plan also prioritizes infrastructure projects for the 2016-2020 period, such as the construction of the light railway network, a fourth bridge between Macau and Taipa, the expansion of the waste incinerator, and the development of an electronic surveillance system.