HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 22 February 1989
香港立法局 —————— 一九八九年二月二十二日
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The reason for this is that the ICAC, as I have explained, operates within a specific charter of investigating corruption offences. If it was asked, or if any other body other than the ICAC was asked, to deal with triad offences, the powers would have to range over the whole spectrum of criminal offences, because it is over the whole spectrum of criminal offences that there is triad involvement. This would mean that inevitably there would be a duplication of police activity, because the police would be retaining non-triad responsibility for offences which would also cover the whole spectrum. I see great danger in a duplication of law-enforcement agencies in Hong Kong, not only from the police point of view but from the point of view of confusion of the general public and the very real question of morale.
Electrically operated remote control gates
4. MRS. LAU asked: Sir, in view of the recent incident in which a young boy was killed by an electric sliding gate, will the Administration inform this Council of the number of such incidents over the past three years in which injuries have been caused by remote control gates; whether the Administration will consider introducing legislation to govern the installation, maintenance and operation of remote control gates; and what measures will be taken by the Administration to prevent the occurrence of similar incidents in the future?
SECRETARY FOR LANDS AND WORKS: Sir, as far as we are aware there were two incidents involving injuries caused by electrically operated remote control sliding gates over the last three years.
These gates can in fact be made relatively safe by a number of different devices, and it seems clear that all such gates should be fitted with one or the other of these. But there is presently no legislation controlling the installation or use of such gates or requiring the use of safety devices.
So we propose first to produce a code of practice to cover these matters for issue to the trade as this is in any case a necessary step and it can be done quickly. At the same time we will also be looking at how best to legislate to enforce safety in this field.
MRS. LAU: Sir, can the Secretary inform this Council whether the Lands and Works Branch has carried out or has plans to carry out any study into the safety features of building installations, including electrically operated doors and gates. If so, when such a study was or will be conducted, and whether the details of such study will be published?
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