Hong Kong Case Law: Decisions & Judgments | LexChat

Hong Kong Case Law

Housing authority duties
  • 11 Jul 2003

    LAM KIN SUM v. HONG KONG HOUSING AUTHORITY

    Citation
    LAM KIN SUM v. HONG KONG HOUSING AUTHORITY
    Court
    Court of First Instance
    Case number
    HCAL198/2002

    The court held that a 'determination of variation of rent' in s.16(1A) is properly understood as a determination to vary rent (an actual variation), not merely a decision to freeze or defer review; however, read in context with the Authority's consistent past practice and the statutory scheme, s.16(1A) implies a duty on the Housing Authority to review rents regularly (triennially after the 1997 amendment) and that duty operates irrespective of inflation or deflation; therefore the Authority's failure to conduct required reviews where the median rent to income ratio exceeded the 10% statutory…