Hong Kong housing: small shoebox flat wins not enough to fix big issues

The Reverend Canon Peter Douglas Koon Ho-ming was blunt when he said, “Once there are no political issues, everything in Hong Kong is a livelihood issue.” He was also correct.

Housing is this city’s biggest livelihood issue. It is also the hardest to tackle by far. The current administration has probably done more in this area than previous ones.

Since Beijing’s top official for Hong Kong affairs Xia Baolong directly called for the eradication of subdivided flats and cage homes in 2021, the government had been forced to deal with its biggest headache: reaching its public housing targets and taking care of those stuck in subdivided flats, many of whom aren’t poor enough to qualify for public housing.

Even if they do qualify, the waiting period is long. For families with young children, this means they’re stuck in these shoebox-sized living spaces while their children grow.

Fortunately for the government, Xia set a deadline of 2049, well down the line. Even with that distant deadline, something had to be done quickly unless the administration wanted to risk being seen as dawdling even after Xia’s ultimatum. First came the quick fix of introducing certification and standards to meet. With that system in place, certified subdivided homes will be officially called “basic housing units”.

Removing the problem of subdivided flats was never going to be simple. The government had to first determine the basic standards for living spaces and weigh them against its ability to take care of displaced families. It cannot crack down on the horrendous living conditions all at once without sending struggling families into the streets.