From Wikipedia: "An expatriate (in abbreviated form, expat) is a person temporarily or permanently residing in a country and culture other than that of the person's upbringing or legal residence."
So from the above, should a former cadet, Chinese and Western (there are plenty of 鬼佬 cadets), who was brought up, and has legal residence, in another country, be considered an expat?
I think we should move away from the argument of "I did my time working in YXXX or CXXX, flying pieces of sh!t through the night, and thus I deserve housing. When I was 24 I was paying 30% of my pay on shared accommodation, asking "You want fries with that?", just so I could afford to buy expired pasta and put fuel in the car. Whereas you joined straight from kindergarten, with no experience, had everything paid for, blah blah". Housing is NOT payment in return for years of hard earned hours. It is an allowance for those not living in their HOME country. Think of it like an overnight allowance.
Now should those cadets, come instructors, be able to move to HKG on full housing, with a higher seniority than the guy/girl sitting next to them on ground school? Probably not, especially if they too have a HKID. Just like that guy who was employed as a DESO, but later forced onto local conditions.
Should a DEFO employed on a base be able to move to HKG and receive full housing after a few years? No I don't think so. They choose to relocate, while working for the same company, to HKG. Whereas the majority had no choice. If they wanted to work for CX, they had to move to HKG. Using this logic, a LEP could choose to relocate to YSSY and expect housing.
What we ALL should be asking for is a base pay increase to keep pace with the cost of things. Not asking for allowances that we are, lets be honest, not entitled to.
PS As for the question of when does an expat become a local? Lets ask NR how long he expects to receive housing?