Author Archives: hksar gov

     To gradually provide more basic public services to meet the needs of the public and enterprises, the Buildings Department (BD) announced today (August 28) that it will implement targeted measures to reduce social contact and infection control measures for the provision of the following counter services from next Monday (August 31) until September 6 in addition to the emergency and essential public services provided in the past month:
      
(a) The Receipt and Dispatch Counter services at the office of the BD’s New Buildings Divisions on 7/F, 14 Taikoo Wan Road, Taikoo Shing, Hong Kong will be open from 9.30am to 3pm from Monday to Friday for receiving statutory submissions and related documents and forms for new building works, and for the applicants to collect processed plans and related documents by appointment;
      
(b) The Building Information Centre at 2/F of the BD Headquarters at North Tower, West Kowloon Government Offices, 11 Hoi Ting Road, Yau Ma Tei, Kowloon, will be open between 10am to 4pm from Monday to Friday for inspection and copying services for private building records. There will be limits on the number of customers to be served in order to reduce social contact;
      
(c) The Receipt Counter at the ground floor of the BD Headquarters will be open between 10am to 4pm on Monday, Wednesday and Friday for receipt of documents from members of the public. There will be limits on the number of customers to be served in order to reduce social contact. In addition, a drop-in box and a tender/quotation box will be provided at the ground floor of the BD Headquarters from 8.30am to 5.30pm from Monday to Friday to supplement the Receipt Counter services.  The department will issue receipts/acknowledgements of documents received via the drop-in boxes in due course; and
      
(d) A Contractor Registration Card Replacement Counter will be set up at the ground floor of the BD Headquarters for Registered Minor Works Contractors (Individual) to replace their registration cards according to the replacement schedule as given in the notification letters issued by the BD in July 2020. The Counter will be open on weekdays between 10am to 4pm starting from next Tuesday (September 1). The BD will implement crowd control arrangement. Therefore, BD appeals to these contractors that instead of visiting the Counter, they can return their old registration cards by post or via the designated drop-in box placed at the ground floor of the BD Headquarters. BD will then send out new registration cards to them via post within 3 weeks. In addition, a hotline (3842 5061) has been set up for these contractors to make appointment to replace their registration cards at the Contractor Registration Card Replacement Counter.
      
     Under the special work arrangement, the handling time of BD’s services may be longer than usual.  
              
     The General Enquiry Counter at the ground floor of the BD Headquarters and meeting rooms of the BD will not be open to the public until further notice. Appointments, meetings (except meetings essential to meet statutory requirements such as Minor Works Contractor Registration Committee meetings) and inspections scheduled for the period may be rescheduled to later dates.  Registration Committee meetings for building professionals and contractors will be re-convened and recruitment interviews will be re-arranged. Individuals concerned will be notified in due course.
           
     The BD appeals to the public to minimise visiting the department’s offices in person unless they genuinely require its public services urgently. The public may call 1823 to make emergency reports. For general enquiries and other reports, they may call 1823 or inform the department by email (enquiry@bd.gov.hk), online reporting (eform.one.gov.hk/form/bd0001/en), fax (2537 4992) or post (BD Headquarters, North Tower, West Kowloon Government Offices, 11 Hoi Ting Road, Yau Ma Tei, Kowloon). In addition, electronic information may be submitted to the BD via receipt@bd.gov.hk.    read more

     The Transport Department (TD) said today (August 28) that to encourage taxi drivers to participate in the Universal Community Testing Programme (UCTP) to be launched on September 1, for early identification of asymptomatic COVID-19 patients in the community and enhancing passengers’ confidence in using taxi services, the taxi trade will launch the “Anti-epidemic Name Tag for Taxi Drivers Scheme” (the Scheme). 
 
     Under the UCTP, participants will be noti­fied of the negative result by SMS through their mobile phones. Taxi drivers who have received the SMS can collect the “Anti-epidemic Tag for Taxi Drivers” (the tag) at about 30 taxi trade organisations joining the Scheme, after verification of the information. The tag will show the name of the taxi driver, taxi driver identity plate number and the date of receipt of negative test result. Taxi drivers will display the tag at a prominent position inside the vehicle compartment. A sample of the tag is at Annex.
 
     The collection of the tag is voluntary and free of charge. No prior booking is required. The list of the taxi trade organisations joining the Scheme with their addresses, operating dates and time will be posted at TD’s website (www.td.gov.hk).
 
     The TD appeals to members of the public transport trade sector (including taxi drivers) to actively participate in the UCTP with a view to achieving the target of early identification of asymptomatic COVID-19 patients to cut the community transmission chain and continuously adopt all feasible prevention measures to protect public health.
 
     The TD will observe the implementation of the UCTP and the Scheme. Depending on the development of the epidemic situation, the TD will explore repeated testing for taxi drivers and enhance the Scheme (such as providing the information shown on the tag through taxi-hailing mobile applications). read more

The following is issued on behalf of the Hospital Authority:      As at 9am today (August 28), 48 COVID-19 confirmed patients were discharged from hospital in the last 24 hours. Including an additional patient (case number: … read more

     The Chief Executive, Mrs Carrie Lam, today (August 28) attended a ceremony to welcome the arrival of the Mainland nucleic acid test support team at Sun Yat Sen Memorial Park Sports Centre in Central and Western District, and inspected the temporary air-inflated laboratories that are ready for commissioning in the Sports Centre.

     Addressing the ceremony, Mrs Lam expressed her heartfelt gratitude to the Central Government for its positive response to the request of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) by establishing speedily a support team and providing necessary equipment and resources to enhance the testing capability of Hong Kong in a short period of time, enabling the HKSAR Government to launch the large-scale Universal Community Testing Programme (UCTP ) to provide voluntary virus testing for all citizens. She thanked each member of the support team on behalf of the Hong Kong people.

     “Since Hong Kong was presented with a new wave of the COVID-19 epidemic comprising mainly local cases in early July, the Central Government has attached great importance to the epidemic situation of Hong Kong. It cares about the safety and health of the Hong Kong people and has given a clear and positive response to the specific requests made by the HKSAR Government,” Mrs Lam said.

     Mrs Lam extended her warm welcome to the chief leader of the support team and Deputy Director of the Medical Administration Bureau of the National Health Commission (NHC), Mr Li Dachuan, who led more than 160 support team members to Hong Kong this morning. The members primarily came from the NHC and Guangdong, and over 10 of them are from Fujian and Guangxi. Together with the 10 members of the advance party and the leader of the support team (Guangdong), Mr Yu Dewen, who arrived early this month, and the 50 members who arrived last week, more than 220 members of the support team are currently in Hong Kong to make preparations for the launch of the large-scale UCTP next Tuesday (September 1). To Mrs Lam’s understanding, the NHC will co-ordinate the arrival of a total of about 600 members of the support team to provide services in Hong Kong subject to the actual need.

     “The social environment of Hong Kong is different from that of the Mainland, and we did not conduct large-scale virus testing for asymptomatic persons during the fight against the disease in the past few months. I am very grateful to the advance party of the support team for their valuable advice on the UCTP. I am deeply impressed by their professionalism and the great importance they attach to the Programme,” Mrs Lam said.

     Mrs Lam and the other officials then inspected the temporary air-inflated laboratories to learn about the facilities, the testing procedures and the workflow. A total of 16 laboratories have been set up in Sun Yat Sen Memorial Park Sports Centre. Sunrise Diagnostic Centre Limited, a joint venture with BGI set up in Hong Kong, is working with the support team in the setting up and operation of the laboratories. Mrs Lam said she was pleased to note that the laboratories, following some two weeks of preparation, are now ready to support large-scale testing.

     “Although the epidemic has eased recently compared to the situation earlier, it has yet to be stabilised. There are still a certain number of confirmed cases every day and a proportion of them are cases with unknown sources of infection, suggesting that there are still silent transmission chains in the community. The UCTP can help us to identify asymptomatic patients and further curb the epidemic, thereby enabling the resumption of normal social lives and economic activities long awaited by the public  as soon as possible. The testing is safe, convenient and speedy with full protection of privacy. I appeal to everyone to participate,” Mrs Lam said.

     The UCTP will be open to the public to sign up and make appointments for testing from tomorrow (August 29). Details are available at www.communitytest.gov.hk.

        

     The Transport Department (TD) said today (August 28) that to align with the gradual resumption of more basic public services by the Government, and also the arrangements for the new school year, franchised bus companies will strengthen or gradually resume bus services next week. 

     The Education Bureau announced earlier that for the prevention and control of COVID-19, students would temporarily learn from home upon commencement of the new school year (generally commence schooling from September 1). Nevertheless, schools should remain open to accommodate students who have to go back to school as necessary. As such, franchised bus companies will, with effect from September 1, resume 18 bus routes and departures serving school areas (details are at the Annex) to cater for the commuting needs of passengers. The bus companies have also arranged spare buses to strengthen those bus routes serving school areas as appropriate to meet the passenger demand. 
 
     The TD has also requested the franchised bus companies to enhance the frequency of their bus routes to meet the passenger demand. The TD has approved Kowloon Motor Bus Company (1933) Limited (KMB), New World First Bus Services Limited (NWFB), Citybus Limited (except airport and North Lantau routes), Long Win Bus Company Limited (LWB) and New Lantao Bus Company (1973) Limited to adjust the peak frequencies of a total of 92 routes, and the off-peak frequencies of a total of 245 routes, from August 31 to September 6. These represent a drop by 50 per cent and 29 per cent respectively for the 183 routes and 346 routes approved from August 24 to 30. Among the routes approved for frequency adjustment, the headway will be lengthened by no more than five minutes during peak and off-peak periods while the headway after 9pm will be lengthened by no more than 10 minutes, and the extended headway will not exceed 30 minutes. Moreover, individual bus routes with extremely low patronage (KMB – four routes, NWFB – three routes, and LWB – one route) have been approved for temporary suspension.
 
     The TD has requested the bus companies to closely monitor changes in passenger demand and consider adjusting services whenever necessary. The service adjustments of the relevant bus routes have been approved for a period of seven days. The TD will consider the actual circumstances to review the service adjustments on a weekly basis, and keep close communication with the bus companies to closely monitor the operational situation and adjust the services according to passenger demand.
 
     In addition, the frequencies of individual bus routes mainly serving tourists, heading to land boundary control points and the airport have already been adjusted to limited service or have suspended the service due to the anti-pandemic measures on boundary control implemented earlier.
      
     The TD’s Emergency Transport Co-ordination Centre (ETCC) will closely monitor the traffic situation and public transport services during the new school year. The ETCC will maintain close liaison with major public transport operators to adjust frequency flexibly and strengthen services when necessary. read more