XN000022-1996-04-24 — Page 38

24

Noise Control (Amendment) Bill 1995

Following is the speech by the Secretary for Planning, Environment and Lands, Mr Bowen Leung, in resuming the second reading debate on the Noise Control (Amendment) Bill 1995 in the Legislative Council today (Wednesday):

Mr Deputy President,

I am grateful to Mrs Miriam Lau, the Chairman of the Bills Committee to study the Noise Control (Amendment) Bill 1995 and the Road Traffic (Amendment) (No. 2) Bill 1995, and other members of the Committee for supporting the Bills.

The Noise Control (Amendment) Bill is part of a legislative package which aims to control vehicle engine noise by requiring newly registered vehicles to meet specified noise emission standards. Adoption of noise standards will prevent vehicles with inferior noise performance from being imported into Hong Kong. The gradual phasing out of vehicles not meeting the standards will help keep noise levels down despite future increases in traffic volume.

When the Bills Committee considered the proposed controls, Members raised some concerns about the noise standards to be adopted and their enforcement.

Members have rightly suggested that we need very stringent noise emission standards to alleviate the problem of traffic noise, given that road traffic in Hong Kong is among the busiest in the world and that a lot of our major roads are very close to noise sensitive residential developments. We share this view wholeheartedly. Hence, we propose to adopt the European and Japanese standards, which are the most stringent standards in the world. It is also our intention to upgrade them in line with future international trend and technological advancement,

We expect that the implementation of the noise.emission standards will bring about a reduction in the overall traffic noise in a few years' time when the existing fleet is gradually replaced by vehicles which are able to meet the stringent noise emission standards. Meanwhile, we would continue to address the problem of traffic noise through careful planning of roads and noise sensitive developments, and implementation of noise mitigation measures such as noise enclosures, noise barriers and quiet road resurfacing programmes.