The Housing Bureau said today that it had received nearly 2,200 submissions of views in its stakeholder consultation on the proposed regulatory regime for Basic Housing Units (BHUs).

Since the establishment of the Task Force on Tackling the Issue of Subdivided Units in October 2023 until the end of the consultation period, the Government organised and joined nearly 40 engagement sessions, meeting nearly 700 participants and gathering views from political parties, academics, professional bodies, non-governmental organisations, estate agents, the renovation services industry, contractors associations as well as concern groups on tackling the subdivided unit (SDU) issue and the BHU regulatory regime.

In addition to extending gratitude to stakeholders for their active expression of views on the regulatory regime, the Government said it is glad that different sectors of society generally support the proposed framework of the BHU regulatory regime while giving suggestions on the execution details.

The Housing Bureau stressed that it will work at full steam to consolidate the views received, report a summary of views to the Legislative Council Panel on Housing, and seek the panel’s views on the latest proposal on the regulatory regime as soon as possible.

Subsequently, the bureau will introduce a bill into LegCo and strive for passage within this year, it added.

Upon completion of the legislative process, registration for pre-existing SDUs under rental will commence, with applications for recognition as BHUs to be accepted concurrently. A grace period will be granted to SDU landlords that have been successfully registered, so that they have reasonable time to discuss tenancy agreements with their tenants and to convert their SDUs to up-to-standard BHUs.