Government urged to explain how firm got go-ahead for work on Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge despite failing to submit 10,000 safety inspection documents
- Thomas Tse of the Hong Kong Construction Association said the incident had cast the city’s industry in a poor light
- China State Construction Engineering (Hong Kong) was contracted to build HK$8.88 billion link road
The Hong Kong government needs to give a full account of how a contractor working on a cross-border mega bridge failed to submit more than 10,000 safety inspection documents on time but still managed to get the go-ahead for the project, a leading voice in the construction industry said on Monday.
Thomas Tse Che-wah, chief executive of the Hong Kong Construction Association, said the scandal, which was revealed on Sunday, had cast the local industry in a bad light, following the controversy of shoddy work on the city’s most expensive rail project, the HK$97.1 billion (US$12.4 billion) Sha Tin-Central rail link.
Tse called on the government to give a full account of why the project was given the green light despite long-overdue submissions, saying the two incidents inevitably undermined public confidence in the city’s construction sector.
These incidents have shown the overall construction industry in a bad light
“These incidents have shown the overall construction industry in a bad light, no matter for the workers, subcontractors, main contractors, and even the project owner, and the MTR Corporation. They have caused the public to cast doubt on the industry’s integrity,” he said.