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Following is a question by the Hon Daniel Lam and a written reply by the Secretary for Security, Mr Ambrose S K Lee, in the Legislative Council today (July 5):
Question:
It was reported that the persistent torrential rain in May and June this year had caused serious flooding in many rural areas in the New Territories (NT), and the residents in those areas had to call the Police for assistance. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) in respect of each of the past four years, of the respective numbers of cases in which residents in the nine regions in NT had to call the Police for assistance due to flooding, the locations and the flooding situation involved in such cases, and the respective longest and shortest time taken by the rescue teams of the relevant government departments to arrive at the scenes in those regions (please set out the information separately according to the nine regions in NT);
(b) whether the time taken by the above-mentioned rescue teams to arrive at the scenes met the performance targets set by their respective departments; if not, of the reasons for the delays;
(c) whether there were cases in which rescue operations were delayed due to unsatisfactory rural roads;
(d) whether it is necessary to provide the departments responsible for rescue operations with additional funding, manpower and equipment in order to avoid the late arrival of rescue teams at the scenes; and
(e) whether other measures are in place to ensure that the rescue teams arrive at the scenes in accordance with the performance targets set by their respective departments?
Reply:
Madam President,
(a) From 2002 to May 2006, there were 26 flooding cases in the New Territories requiring the Fire Services Department (FSD) to carry out rescue operations. The related figures, by year and by district in the New Territories, are as follows:
District Year
-------- ----
2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 Total
(up to
May 2006)
---- ---- ---- ---- ---------- -----
Yuen Long 3 3 1 - 1 8
North 1 5 - 1 - 7
Tuen Mun - 1 - 4 - 5
Tai Po - - - 2 - 2
Sha Tin - 1 - - 1 2
Kwai Tsing - - - 2 - 2
Tsuen Wan - - - - - -
Sai Kung - - - - - -
Islands - - - - - -
----- ---- ---- ---- ---- --------- -----
Total 4 10 1 9 2 26
Please also see the attached table for the locations involved in the flooding cases. FSD does not have details of the flooding situation of each case. Regarding the time needed for FSD personnel to arrive at scene, generally speaking, it would be affected by the geographical location, surrounding environment and traffic condition, etc. From 2002 to May 2006, for cases requiring FSD's rescue, FSD personnel could arrive at scene within three to 14 minutes. There was only one case in May 2003 which took FSD personnel about 31 minutes to arrive at the village hut calling for assistance because of the inclement weather and traffic conditions.
(b) At present, FSD has set graded response time for building fire calls and target response time for emergency ambulance calls. No performance pledges for other rescue calls have been set, and as an important principle of rescue operations, FSD will arrive at the scene as soon as possible.
(c) In responding to calls for assistance in flooding cases, FSD has not experienced delay in its rescue operations because of unsatisfactory rural roads.
(d) & (e) The Government attaches great importance to emergency rescue services on which people's lives depend. The Government will inject sufficient resources as required and appropriate to ensure that relevant departments can provide swift and efficient emergency rescue services. Currently, FSD's manpower and equipments are sufficient for handling different kinds of flooding incidents. FSD will review its practices from time to time to further enhance the efficiency of rescue operations.
Ends/Wednesday, July 5, 2006
Issued at HKT 16:55
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