There were 677 construction accidents in the first quarter, down 13% on the same period last year. The accident rate per thousand workers also fell 10.4% from 47.1 to 42.2.

Speaking at the Construction Association's Annual Safety Conference today, Permanent Secretary for Economic Development & Labour Matthew Cheung said the figures show the improvement in safety performance has been sustained.

However, falls from height remain the most important cause of fatalities in the construction industry, Mr Cheung said. From 2000 to 2004, 43.9% of fatal accidents could be attributed to that cause. Among these, nearly half involved bamboo scaffolds, working platforms or unfenced dangerous places.

"As a major initiative this year, we will carry out large-scale enforcement campaigns targeting unsafe scaffolds and dangerous places on construction sites. We will also launch major publicity campaigns to ram home the safety message," he said.

Special strategy

On safety in repair, maintenance, minor alteration and addition 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.

To tackle the problem, the Labour Department has adopted a special strategy to monitor the 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 said.

Public/private sector sites

At public sector sites, the accident rate per thousand workers fell 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 said 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," he said.

"In this connection, I am pleased to see that the Real Estate Developers Association and the Construction Association have jointly signed the Safety Partnering Agreement providing a framework for implementing measures such as the Pay for Safety Scheme."