5.
He pointed out that in the first half of 1995, the department had been able to respond to 90 per cent of all fire calls in buildings within the graded response time of six minutes in built-up areas.
"During the same period, our emergency ambulance services has been able to respond to 90 per cent of all emergency calls within a travel time of 10 minutes or less," Mr Lai said.
He noted that there had been an 8.6 per cent increase in the total number of emergency ambulance calls in the first nine months of 1995 as compared with the same period last year.
He explained that there were a number of factors which constrained the performance of emergency ambulance services.
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"There has been a gradual increase in workload as the total number of emergency ambulance calls continue to rise, especially in the New Territories.
"The increasing geographical spread of population in the New Territories has made it difficult for the existing ambulance depots to provide full geographical coverage to all demands for emergency ambulance services in the New Territories.
"Moreover, traffic congestion and inclement weather often affect our performance significantly," he said.
To improve the performance of ambulance services, Mr Lai said, the Government was now studying the recommendations by the consultant commissioned by the department to study the provision of ambulance services.
"In the short term, we will be looking at possible means to redeploy our existing resources to strengthen areas where coverage is inadequate.
"We will also be reviewing the operational procedures on ambulance deployment to achieve a more effective mobilisation," he said.
Mr Lai said he believed that with the implementation of the short-term measures, the performance of ambulance services will be improved by two per cent.
"As for the longer term, we will need to look for additional resources to provide for more ambulances and crew, as well as to construct more depots to extend the emergency ambulance coverage," he added.
End/Saturday, October 14, 1995