Enforcement

Under the Town Planning Ordinance, no person should undertake or
continue a development in a development permission area unless the
development was a use-in-existence before the gazetting of the relevant
Interim DPA/DPA plans, or is permitted under the DPA plan or the
replacement OZP, or has been approved by the TPB. Any development
which cannot satisfy any of these criteria is an unauthorised development
(UD).

The Planning Authority may serve notices on the respective land-owners,
occupiers and responsible persons, requiring them to discontinue the UD
by a specified date unless planning permission for the development is
obtained, or demanding a reinstatement of the land. It is an offence in law
if the requirements of the notices are not complied with.

Most of the UDs in the rural New Territories were related to site
formation; earth-filling; the open storage of vehicles, containers,
trailer/tractors and construction materials; and vehicle repair workshops.
In 1997, 251 complaints and 383 referrals of suspected UDs from other
government departments were received and 166 suspected UDs were
detected through patrolling. The Director of Planning issued 321 warning
letters for 144 cases, 1 664 enforcement notices for 285 cases, 72
reinstatement notices for five cases and 1 405 compliance notices for 218
cases. As for the prosecution, 41 defendants in 25 cases were convicted
and the average of fine was $37,730 with a range of $5,000 to $300,000.
Upon taking enforcement action, 173 UDs were discontinued and 112
UDs were regularised through section 16 planning application, which
involved 43 ha and 60 ha of land respectively.

Special teams have also been set up to work in collaboration with the
Black Spots Task Force of Lands Department on the common objective
of cleaning up the environmental black spots in the rural New Territories.
The special teams are to expedite enforcement and prosecution actions
against UDs in the Pat Heung Pilot Action Area, the North District East
Action Area and the Tuen Mun Container Action Area.

 

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