YEUNG PUI YEE SANDY v. AURORA B. GO

CACV 365/2000

IN THE HIGH COURT OF THE

HONG KONG SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE REGION

COURT OF APPEAL

CIVIL APPEAL NO. 365 OF 2000

(ON APPEAL FROM LDPD NO. 1054 OF 2000)

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J U D G M E N T

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1. The Applicant is the landlady of a flat in Queen's Road West. The Respondent is her tenant. The rent is $7,500.00 a month payable on the first day of each month. The tenant fell into arrears, and on 26 June the landlady obtained an order for possession of the flat in the Lands Tribunal. That order was suspended on two conditions. The first was that the tenant paid the following sums totalling $13,500.00 to the landlady by 24 July: (a) the sum of $5,000.00, being the balance of the arrears of rent for May, (b) the sum of $7,500.00, being the rent due on 1 June, and (c) the sum of $1,000.00 fixed costs. The second condition was that the tenant paid the current rent as it fell due.

2. By 24 July, the tenant had only paid the sum of $7,500.00 to the landlady, i.e. the rent due on 1 June. So the tenant applied for further time to pay the arrears of $6,000.00 and the rent due on 1 July. That application was heard on 9 August. No further sum had been paid. The Lands Tribunal dismissed her application. Accordingly, a warrant for possession was issued on 14 August.

3. The tenant is appealing to the Court of Appeal against the dismissal on 9 August of her application for further time to pay the arrears. She is now asking for a stay of the execution of the order for possession pending her appeal. That application came before me on 7 September, when the tenant through her husband requested an adjournment because she was in the Philippines. It was adjourned until today because it was said that she would be back in Hong Kong by today. However, she is still in the Philippines, and she asks for her application to be further adjourned until 19 September.

4. However, the landlady tells me that the tenant has not paid anything further to her. The tenant's husband is not in a position to dispute that. The position today, therefore, is that the tenant has not paid (a) the balance of the arrears of rent from May, i.e. $5,000.00, (b) the fixed costs of $1,000.00, (c) the rent of $7,500.00 due on 1 July, (d) the rent of $7,500.00 due on 1 August, and (e) the rent of $7,500.00 due on 1 September. These sums amount to $28,500.00. The tenant's monthly salary is only $10,000.00, and she is in dispute with her employer in the Philippines who has not paid her since July. She does not say that she has any savings to speak of. There is, therefore, no possibility of the tenant being able to pay the arrears amounting to $28,500.00 and to continue to pay the current rent.

5. In these circumstances, there is, I believe, no chance of the tenant persuading the Court of Appeal that the Lands Tribunal was wrong not to give her further time to pay the arrears. Since her appeal is so unlikely to succeed, it would be wrong to stay the execution of the order for possession. Her application for an adjournment of her application for a stay of execution of that order is refused, and the application for a stay must be dismissed.