Hong Kong should make safety design a part of all building development plans and address the culture of rushing work at construction sites, industry leaders have said after the city recorded 15 fatal industrial accidents earlier this year. Their calls followed the warning by Construction Industry Council chairman Thomas Ho On-sing on Monday that the…
Hong Kong labour unionists have called for employers to be required to provide outdoor workers with heatstroke-prevention equipment during extreme temperatures. They also said on Saturday that heatstroke should be added to the list of statutory occupational diseases, making it easier for workers to claim compensation in work-related cases. The calls for better protection for…
Hong Kong authorities are under pressure to review the warning system for heat stress at work after it remained at the lowest risk level on Sunday, despite the city sweltering through its hottest day on record. Labour unionists, joined by a leading meteorologist, also proposed relaxing the law to recognise heatstroke as a work-related injury,…
Some Hong Kong workers have said they intend to quit smoking as a new ban on smoking at construction sites came into force on Friday. The ban came in the wake of the deadly fire at Tai Po’s Wang Fuk Court housing estate, a disaster that killed 168 people last November and was suspected to…
Hong Kong labour unions have urged worksite supervisors to step up risk assessments and precautionary measures to strengthen work safety culture, as the city reported at least 62 industrial accidents, including 24 fatal cases, in the first half of this year. The calls on Wednesday followed the case of a worker who was killed when…
Hong Kong should review its crane safety guidelines to include mandatory testing for metal fatigue, an industry expert has said after the city recorded another fatal case involving a collapse. An operator was killed on Thursday afternoon when a tower crane fell at a construction site for the second phase of a public housing project…
Hong Kong plumber Anson Hui Po-lung is ready to work through his Lunar New Year break to make ends meet, after struggling since the citywide removal of scaffolding nets began in early December, in response to the deadly blaze at Tai Po’s Wang Fuk Court. Twenty public housing projects and 230 private buildings undergoing major…
Hong Kong authorities are considering changing the proposed fine for smoking on a construction site to a fixed penalty of HK$3,000 (US$385) rather than a maximum of HK$150,000. Secretary for Labour and Welfare Chris Sun Yuk-han said on Tuesday that the initial plan was to amend the Factories and Industrial Undertakings Ordinance, which only stipulates…
Hong Kong’s construction industry body has begun distributing 3,000 rigorously tested scaffolding nets from a 12,000-unit shipment to 11 contractors overseeing 19 renovation sites, following the suspension of hundreds of projects after the deadly Tai Po inferno. The Construction Industry Council (CIC) said on Thursday that it had received 12,000 centrally procured nets from Guangdong…
One month after the Wang Fuk Court fire, Hong Kong’s construction industry grapples with a scaffold net safety regime halting repairs on over 200 buildings. In the third part of a series, Edith Lin and Vivian Au report on calls for certified suppliers, expedited testing and a broader accountability overhaul. Here’s part one and two….