Ceiling on claims may be doubled
New Straits Times 3/3/2006 By R. Sonia

KUALA LUMPUR, Thurs.

Aggrieved house buyers may soon have reason to smile.

The Housing and Local Government Ministry wants the ceiling amount that can be claimed at the Tribunal for Homebuyers Claims to be increased from RM25,000 to RM50,000.

This is among amendments being considered to strengthen the Housing Development (Control and Licencing) Act 1966.

Housing and Local Government Minister Datuk Seri Ong Ka Ting said the draft of the amendments was ready but needed fine-tuning before being presented to Parliament later this year.

"Although there was a major revamp of the Act in 2002, the ministry is still not satisfied and feels the Act can be improved further," he said after a working visit to the tribunal and the monitoring and enforcement division.

He said the law could only be amended if other agencies demanded simultaneous amendments to related Acts.

Asked about the proposed 10 per cent payment by property buyers to be held in trust until projects were completed, he said the ministry was in the process of submitting a paper on the matter to the Cabinet.

"We are now getting the views of government agencies, including the Attorney-General’s Chambers. The paper is almost ready. We will take it to the Cabinet very soon," he said.

On the tribunal, he said 15,698 cases had been registered up to last December.

Of this number, decisions had been handed down in 14,360 cases with 1,338 cases still pending decision.

He said 90 per cent of the awards were adhered to while decisions in 1,542 cases involving 226 developers had been ignored.

Ong said the ministry also intended to have branches of the tribunal in the northern, southern and eastern zones.

As an interim measure, he said, tribunal presidents had started hearing cases in Penang, Sungai Petani, Batu Gajah and Johor Baru.

"This is now under discussion between my ministry, the Public Service Department and the Finance Ministry to fulfil staffing requirements.