185 (220)
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Mr. Humphreys.-There is one other point in the same connection. In all your con- tracts, I think there is a clause that if the contractor has not finished within a certain time, he has to pay a penalty?
A. Yes.
Q. And if you fail to get these certificates, for no reason at all practically, and it is kept back for a couple of months, this poor contractor has to pay two months penalty?
A. I am sorry to say that that clause is not always enforced.
Q.-But he is bound to pay that penalty if enforced?
A.-Yes.
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Q. In fact, let us say the contractor pays it and the next block he puts up for you, he says "My word, because the Sanitary Board would not give me a certificate in time, I had to pay a penalty. I am going to put on an allowance in my tender for that". That is quite possible, is it not?
A. Yes.
The Chairman.--And the contractor, you dont pay him presumably his final payment until the place is passed for occupation?
A.--The clause in our agreement is that the thing is not completed, until the certificate is issued.
Q.--And the man is kept out of his money for six weeks say for no reason at all?
A.-- Yes.
Mr. Lau Chu Pak.-And the contractor has paid interest on the money he borrows?
A. Yes, under the existing conditions, under which the Officers of the Board are Civil Servants, they are of course liable to reprimand, and be called over the coals by the Governor or by the Head of his Department for any departure from the Ordinance. They practically admit to you that a thing is absurd. You go to a Government Official, and say ask me to do is absurd ", and they will say "There is the Ordinance, there is no help for it".
The Chairman.What class of officers are you referring to?
what you
A. All of them. There is no distinction. An officer is liable to reprimand if he departs in any way from the Ordinance, however ridiculous the clause may be. I once built a latrine, the house abutted against a cliff, so that there was no overlooking it. Instead of putting in a window two feet square, I put in a door, leaving two feet at the bottom and six feet at the top open to the air; I was refused a certificate for that, because it was not in accordance with the Ordinance.
Mr. Shelton Hooper.-It was a far more sanitary thing you did, than if you had complied with the Ordinance?
A. Yes. These things are a matter of daily practice. There are almost any num- ber of variations in the sizes and shapes of houses, and the widths and sizes of streets. An officer of the Government cannot give you any relief, without laying himself open to censure, and it is perfectly natural that they should not take the responsibility.
The Chairman.-If your idea is adopted, and the Department is self contained, and it has its own Executive Engineer, you think that that Executive Engineer should have discretionary powers for small work of that sort?
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