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1. Challenges ahead for construction safety

1. Challenges ahead for construction safety
Hong Kong Government, 30 August 2005

More effort was required in four specific areas to further improve the construction industry's safety performance, Permanent Secretary for Economic Development and Labour, Mr Matthew Cheung Kin-chung, said today (August 30).

Addressing the Annual Safety Conference of the Hong Kong Construction Association, Mr Cheung said that the four areas were improving safety in repair, maintenance, minor alteration and addition (RMAA) works; tackling the most common cause of fatal and serious accidents – the fall of a person from height; closing the gap between the safety performance of public sector sites and that of private sector sites; and enhancing safety awareness.

On safety in RMAA works, Mr Cheung said the number of accidents arising from this sector accounted for a considerable proportion of all construction accidents. The share went up to 37.9% in 2004 from 28.5% in 2000.

"The majority of these works has been undertaken by small contractors, employing only a few workers with work activities lasting only a short time. Works of this scale are not required to be reported to the Labour Department. As a result, many such works would not come to our notice until something serious has happened," he said.

To tackle the problem, the Labour Department has adopted a special strategy to monitor these works. "In addition to routine inspections, our Occupational Safety Officers carry out patrol operations covering districts and areas to detect such works.
“Our operations demand high mobility and flexibility. Our officers not only step up point-to-point inspections on normal working days, but also at night and during holidays to clamp down on offending contractors. We have adopted a more tactical approach," Mr
Cheung explained.

He added that the department had established a reporting mechanism with the Hong Kong Association of Property Management Companies through which association members would notify the department of high-risk property renovation and maintenance works.

Meanwhile, accident statistics indicate that "fall of person from height" remains the single most important cause of fatalities in the construction industry. During the five-year period from 2000 to 2004, 43.9% of the fatal accidents in the construction industry could be attributed to that cause. Among these cases, nearly half involved bamboo scaffolds, working platforms/falsework or unfenced dangerous places.

Mr Cheung said the department was determined to address this common cause of fatal and serious accidents. "As a major initiative this year, we will carry out large-scale enforcement campaigns targeting at unsafe scaffolds and dangerous places on construction sites. We will also launch major publicity campaigns to ram home the safety message," he said.

Regarding the safety performance of public sector sites, the accident rate per thousand workers dropped from 81.7 in 2000 to 29.4 in 2004. This compared with the accident rate per thousand workers in the entire construction industry of 60.3 in 2004.

Mr Cheung pointed out that the accident rate of public sector sites was significantly lower than that of private sector sites, which stood at 233.7 in 2000 and 83.7 in 2004. To close the gap, Mr Cheung urged the private sector to catch up with the public sector.

"This would be possible if the best practices adopted in managing public sector sites were applied to private sector sites. In this connection, I am pleased to see that the Real Estate Developers Association and the Hong Kong Construction Association have jointly signed the Safety Partnering Agreement providing a framework for implementing measures such as the 'Pay for Safety Scheme'," he said.

Mr Cheung said the ultimate prevention of workplace accidents and occupational diseases lay in the workforce having a strong safety and health awareness and a positive safety culture.

"Over the years, the department has been working in close partnership with our stakeholders in organising promotional activities and publicity to raise safety awareness.

"Our educational and training programmes, including 'mandatory basic safety training' introduced a few years ago, are also geared towards helping the industry to promote a safety culture," he said. To date, more than 700,000 construction workers have completed the mandatory safety training ("Green Card" course).

Mr Cheung also briefed participants of the conference on the Government's strategy for managing construction safety and the safety performance of the industry.

We have been striving to bring about real improvement in this hazardous industry through a multi-pronged approach of legislation and enforcement; education and training; and promotion and publicity.

"We also believe that a proactive safety management approach with the ultimate objective of self-regulation by the duty holders is the key to enhancing the standards of occupational safety and health in Hong Kong," he said.

He said the Government, as the client of public works and housing projects, also played an important role.

"It is our firm belief that the Government must lead by example and demonstrate the best practices in safety and health management in its projects.

"Over the years, the Government has introduced a number of measures, including the Independent Safety Audit Programme, the Pay for Safety Scheme, the Safe Working Cycle and the regulatory actions against contractors with poor safety performance.

"All these measures aim to ensure that high standards of work safety are achieved by contractors of government projects," he noted.

On the safety performance of the construction industry, Mr Cheung said that it had improved significantly over the years through the concerted efforts of all the parties concerned.

The improvement in safety performance has been sustained. In the first quarter of this year, the number of construction accidents stood at 677, representing a drop of 13% from 778 in the same period last year. The accident rate per thousand workers also fell 10.4% from 47.1 to 42.2.

Mr Cheung said that through collective wisdom and concerted efforts, the construction industry would be able to rise to the challenges.