Following is a question by the Hon Julia Lau and a written reply by the Secretary for Development, Ms Bernadette Linn, in the Legislative Council today (October 21):
Question:
Works departments of the Government prepare quarterly performance reports to assess the performance of contractors across various public works contracts, with site safety being a key attribute. The industry has reflected that the existing assessment system often fails to accurately reflect the actual safety levels and risk profiles of individual sites (such as the severity of work injuries involved), and is also unfair to public works contractors (contractors) who have accumulated demerit points due to individual incidents involving minor injuries, which may even lead to unreasonable disqualification from tendering or prohibition from participating in tenders. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(1) how the works departments, the Hong Kong Housing Authority and the Labour Department currently handle work injury cases of varying degrees of severity when assessing the site safety performance of contractors and calculating the accident rates of public works; under the existing tender evaluation mechanism, whether minor injury incidents (such as those requiring treatment on the spot or brief absence from work) are aggregated with fatal accidents or incidents resulting in serious disability and affect the scores of contractors; if so, of the reasons; if the authorities adopt an "all-inclusive" approach, whether they have assessed if such an approach would result in the tender scores of contractors being excessively affected by minor injury incidents, thereby failing to differentiate genuinely high-risk and poorly-managed sites;
(2) in the past five years (from 2021 to 2025), among contractors' scoring records at the end of a quarter or upon completion of works in respect of various types of public works and public housing works, of the situations where demerit points were allotted to contractors due to site accidents; among them, the respective numbers and proportions of cases involving (i) fatal incidents or incidents resulting in serious disability and (ii) minor injury incidents; and
(3) whether the authorities will consider introducing a more refined "grading system for work injuries on construction sites" in the scoring of "site safety" and the calculation of site accident rates, under which grading will be made according to the severity and risk nature of the accidents, and differential scores and demerit point arrangements will be set for different grades; in addition, whether the authorities will consider introducing a reasonable tolerance for minor incidents, and specifying the circumstances under which the situation will be regarded as poor management and allot demerit points, as well as specifying the categories of work injuries that will affect the tendering eligibility of contractors, thereby clarifying the weighting of various types of work injuries in the scoring; if so, of the relevant progress and direction of the study; if not, whether the authorities will conduct a review?
Reply:
President,
The Government attaches great importance to site safety. When evaluating tenders for public works contracts, in addition to considering the tender price, we also assess the technical competence and past performance of tenderers. Depending on the complexity of the projects, technical score could account for 40 per cent to 50 per cent of the overall score. As regards the technical score, tenderers' abilities to ensure site safety and their past performance are the key attributes taken into consideration. Under the current tender evaluation mechanism, attributes related to site safety make up about 30 per cent of the technical score. In addition, the Development Bureau (DEVB) closely monitors the performance of contractors in undertaking public works contracts through the quarterly performance assessment mechanism, in which site safety is one of the important assessment items. If a contractor's site safety performance in a public works contract is unsatisfactory, in addition to requiring immediate improvements, we will, depending on the performance and persistency in respective aspects (such as provision and maintenance of plant, working environment, safety information, safety instruction and training, safe system of work, employment of safety officer/supervisor, site accident record and severity of site accidents), reflect in the score of its quarterly performance report, which will affect its chances of winning future tenders. In serious cases, different regulating actions will be taken against the contractor concerned, including suspending it from tendering for public works contracts or even removal from the approved lists of public works contractors.
Having consulted the Hong Kong Housing Authority (HA) and the Labour Department (LD), the co-ordinated replies to various parts of the question are as follows:
(1) The LD compiles the industrial accident rate of the construction industry, based on fatal accidents or accidents with injuries resulting in incapacities for more than three days due to industrial activities that occurred in industrial undertakings as defined under the Factories and Industrial Undertakings Ordinance. In compiling the accident rate of public works contracts, the DEVB takes into account reportable accidents occurring on construction sites, including (i) fatal accidents, (ii) serious bodily injury accidents, and (iii) accidents with injuries resulting in incapacities for more than three days ((ii) and (iii) are collectively referred to as "non-fatal reportable accidents"). Minor injury incidents are not taken into account.
In assessing the performance of public works contractors, works departments take into account their performance across various aspects of site safety, including scoring based on the accident rate of the public works contract and the severity of various categories of site accidents mentioned above, rather than assessing and handling them in an identical manner. If the accident rate of a public works contract is higher than the accident rate limit (viz. 0.3 reportable accidents per 100 000 man-hours worked), the aspect "site accident record" in the quarterly performance report of the contractor will be rated "Poor", which will in turn affect the rating of the whole site safety performance attribute. Generally speaking, if a serious bodily injury accident occurs in a public works contract during the quarter, the whole site safety performance attribute of the contractor in its quarterly performance report will be rated "Poor" or even "Very Poor". If a fatal accident occurs, it will be rated "Very Poor".
(2) The number of public works contractors whose site safety performance was rated as "Poor" or "Very Poor" in the quarterly performance reports due to their involvement in fatal accidents or serious bodily injury accidents over the past five years (viz. from 2021 to 2025) is set out at Annex 1. In addition, non-reportable minor injury incidents in public works contracts do not directly affect quarterly performance assessments, and the DEVB does not maintain such information.
(3) If a contractor on the "List of Approved Contractors for Public Works" and the "List of Approved Suppliers of Materials and Specialist Contractors for Public Works" is involved in a serious site safety incident, and there is sufficient preliminary information causing the DEVB to reasonably suspect that the contractor may have caused or contributed to the incident, irrespective of whether it occurred on a public works, public sector or private sector site, and even if the LD's investigation is still ongoing and the cause of the incident has not been concluded yet, the DEVB will, in accordance with the regulating mechanism, suspend the contractor's tendering eligibility for public works contracts under relevant category or categories of works within a short period of time, to facilitate a prudent examination. Any tenders already submitted by the contractor concerned for public works contracts will not be considered during the suspension period. Subsequently, a Panel of Enquiry will be convened, and further regulating actions will be taken against the contractor as necessary, including suspension of tendering eligibility or even removal from the approved lists of public works contractors.
When evaluating tenders for public works contracts, works departments take into account the contractor's past performance, including the overall site safety performance in public works contracts, the accident rate of public works contracts (including non-fatal reportable accidents), and the records of serious site safety incidents (including fatal accidents or serious bodily injury accidents). Minor injury incidents are not considered.
As regards the mechanism of the HA, if a contractor is involved in fatal or serious industrial accidents, the HA could take stringent regulating actions against the contractor concerned, including co-operating with the LD on the investigation, suspending it from tendering, and deducting marks from its safety performance score and its future works tenders of the HA. If a contractor is involved in minor injury incidents, it will not directly result in deduction from its safety performance score or affect its tendering eligibility. The HA compiles accident rates of works contracts on a quarterly basis as a key indicator for monitoring contractors' overall safety risks and determining whether regulating action should be taken. The number of cases in which contractors had marks deducted in works tenders for the HA due to their involvement in fatal or serious industrial accidents (whether or not occurring in HA works) over the past five years is at Annex 2.
In summary, the Government considers that the current mechanism can effectively identify high-risk works contracts and those with poor management, facilitating early intervention and prompt implementation of improvement measures, with a view to uplifting site safety performance. Through these measures, we also aim to motivate contractors to continuously maintain good site safety performance.
As pointed out in parts (1) and (2) of the reply above, the Government has in fact implemented appropriate measures in assessment of performance of public works contractors and tender evaluation, based on the performance and persistency in respective assessment aspects and the severity of site accidents. In addition, works departments and the HA also evaluate the safety management systems and risk control measures implemented by contractors, as well as their practical implementation, through routine inspections, safety audits and surprise checks, rather than considering the numbers of accidents only. Works departments and the HA have established an alerting mechanism. When the accident rates or the numbers of accidents exceed the limits, follow-up actions will be taken against the contractors concerned and, where necessary, the LD's investigation will be proactively supported.
Apart from monitoring contractors' safety performance through assessment and regulating mechanisms, the Government has continuously strengthened the preventive measures in recent years by driving a wider adoption of innovation technologies to enhance the risk identification, management and control capabilities on site. The key measures include promoting a wider adoption of Smart Site Safety System (4S) which enables early identification of unsafe acts and potential risks. Furthermore, through contractual provisions, the HA also integrates safety data collected by 4S into the AI+ "HA-PIMAP" Project Information Management and Analytics Platform to strengthen the monitoring of contractors' safety performance and enhance the safety awareness of the frontline site personnel.
The objective of the Government is to minimise site safety accidents involving casualties of different degrees of severity and nature. We will continuously review the assessment and monitoring mechanism of contractors as well as the tender evaluation mechanism to ensure that these mechanisms can effectively identify site safety incidents and performance.