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4.13 The number of professional staff on the present establishment has proved insufficient at times to deal with the current building programme and it has therefore been necessary to employ the services of five private firms of quantity surveyors for some 20% of the output of the Branch for the year under review. The situation is further aggravated by the increasing number and complexity of claims submitted by contractors.
4.14 During the year under review 208 contracts were placed to a total value of $561 million and some 8,676 accounts, to a total value of $45.78 million, were checked for building work executed under the Maintenance Contracts.
4.15 Building costs continued to rise throughout the year and the total increase was about 29% over the previous year. Although this is considerably higher than the rate of increase reported for the previous year, more than one third of the increase occurred in June/July of the year under review due to the dramatic rise in the cost of mild steel reinforcement. In January 1974, a sharp rise in the cost of cement again caused an upsurge in building costs. Labour costs have remained reasonably constant during the year under review and this may be attributed to an apparent reduction in building activity in the private sector, thus increasing competition for public contracts, and the fact that more skilled labour has been attracted back to the industry now that wages are generally higher.
4.16 The Branch has, in addition, been responsible for the collation of statistical and cost advisory information relating to buildings and building materials and for providing advice to other departments on co-operative housing schemes.
## STRUCTURAL ENGINEERING BRANCH
### Government Structural Engineer:
AU Sik-ling, J.P., B.Sc. (Lingnan University), C.Eng., F.I.Struct.E.
LEE Hak-kim, B.Sc., M.Sc., C.Eng., F.I.Struct.E.
4.17 This Branch, under the control of the Government Structural Engineer, is responsible for the structural design of all projects undertaken by Architectural Office. This includes maintenance work, the preparation of structural drawings, details and bending schedules for steel reinforcement, the supervision of reinforced concrete and structural steel works, and advice to other divisions of the office on the structural feasibility of projects.
4.18 The Branch is divided into five groups, each headed by a Senior Structural Engineer, which deal respectively with major works, Government Housing Projects, Defence works, minor works and maintenance works. Each group is staffed by structural engineers and assistant structural engineers with supporting technical staff.
4.19 During the year, the Branch completed the structural design of over 290 separate new buildings and supervised foundation and structural works at over 200 sites, including the sinking of over 3,750 precast and in-situ concrete piles, and repair work due to damage caused by 14 landslides. The Branch also used over 60 hours of computer processing time at the Government Computer Centre for programme development and productive work.
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