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GENERAL
INTRODUCTION
1.01. The Colony of Hong Kong has an area of approximately 398 square miles with an estimated population at 31st March, 1968 of 3,900,000. The bulk of this population is concentrated in a very intensively developed area of some nine square miles covering the northern shore of Hong Kong Island, the Kowloon peninsula and New Kowloon from Lei Yue Mun in the east to Lai Chi Kok in the west. Tsuen Wan, in the New Territories a few miles northwest of Lai Chi Kok, has developed rapidly and now has a population of 225,000. The extent of these urban concentrations is shown in the frontispiece map.
1.02. 1967-68 saw the Communist confrontation and a serious water shortage which was aggravated by political factors. Details of how the Department was affected are recorded in the chapters dealing with the work of the various sub-departments, but a summary of the main events of the year will not be out of place.
1.03. The disturbances of May and June 1967 involved all sub-departments, particularly the Electrical & Mechanical Office whose task it was to give a round-the-clock maintenance service to Police vehicles and to supply men and vehicles for a variety of emergency duties. Its workshops, in common with the depots of the Waterworks Office, on both sides of the harbour, were scenes of intimidation and violence at the height of the disturbances. Senior officers were detained by militant strikers and suffered threats to their personal safety but happily none suffered injury. As a result of these incidents some 519 employees out of a total labour force of nearly 4,000 were dismissed and have since been replaced. The Civil Engineering Office also lost some of its minor staff but no incidents were reported. Thanks to the loyalty of the vast majority of workers there was no serious interference with the services offered by these three sub-departments to the public and other Government departments.
1.04. A period of very dry weather, extending back to August 1966, had necessitated the restriction of water supply to 16 hours daily in February 1967. As the dry weather continued, the supply periods were successively reduced to eight hours daily on 1st June and to four hours daily.
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GENERAL
INTRODUCTION
1.01. The Colony of Hong Kong has an area of approximately 3981 square miles with an estimated population at 31st March, 1968 of 3,900,000. The bulk of this population is concentrated in a very intensively developed area of some nine square miles covering the northern shore of Hong Kong Island, the Kowloon peninsula and New Kowloon from Lei Yue Mun in the east to Lai Chi Kok in the west. Tsuen Wan, in the New Territories a few miles northwest of Lai Chi Kok, has developed rapidly and now has a population of 225,000. The extent of these urban con- centrations is shown in the frontispiece map.
1.02. 1967-68 saw the Communist confrontation and a serious water shortage which was aggravated by political factors. Details of how the Department was affected are recorded in the chapters dealing with the work of the various sub-departments, but a summary of the main events of the year will not be out of place.
1.03. The disturbances of May and June 1967 involved all sub- departments, particularly the Electrical & Mechanical Office whose task it was to give a round-the-clock maintenance service to Police vehicles and to supply men and vehicles for a variety of emergency duties. Its workshops, in common with the depots of the Waterworks Office, on both sides of the harbour, were scenes of intimidation and violence at the height of the disturbances. Senior officers were detained by militant strikers and suffered threats to their personal safety but happily none suffered injury. As a result of these incidents some 519 employees out of a total labour force of nearly 4,000 were dismissed and have since been replaced. The Civil Engineering Office also lost some of its minor staff but no incidents were reported. Thanks to the loyalty of the vast majority of workers there was no serious interference with the services offered by these three sub-departments to the public and other Government depart-
ments.
1.04. A period of very dry weather, extending back to August 1966, had necessitated the restriction of water supply to 16 hours daily in February 1967. As the dry weather continued, the supply periods were successively reduced to eight hours daily on 1st June and to four hours
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