***********************************************************
Following is a transcript of remarks (English portion) by the Secretary for Transport and Housing, Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung, on the service disruption of the MTR Corporation Limited (MTRCL) during the typhoon Vincente today (July 24):
Secretary for Transport and Housing: During the typhoon Vincente, of course, road transport, ferries and air transport have been affected and this has caused inconvenience to passengers. However, we are grateful to the frontline workers of various government departments and public organisations as well as public transport operators in coping with the typhoon and the consequences brought about by the typhoon.
We are aware that there are strong views about the disruption of the East Rail resulting from the breakdown of electricity supply. We know that the MTRCL has been trying its best to handle the disruption. A lot of their staff have spent long hours in making repairs and in coping with post-disruption arrangements.
From the government's point of view, there are three major concerns whenever such disruption happens. First, safety, the safety of the passengers and all those people affected by the incident must be the first priority; and secondly, how to handle the post-incident arrangements; and thirdly, the transparency, the communication between the MTRCL and the passengers.
We are of the view that the MTRCL has tried their best to put the safety of passengers first, but of course we have heard some comments on whether the communication aspect or the post-incident arrangements could be done better. And we are in close liaison with the MTRCL to try to learn lessons from this incident. The Transport Department is arranging a meeting with the MTRCL next week, and we have also asked the MTRCL to submit a report. Under the existing mechanism, such report should be submitted to the government within three days.
Reporter: Secretary, obviously ... the problem we encountered are breakdown of communications and transparency.
Secretary for Transport and Housing: Listening to views and comments made by members of the public so far, I think most agree that the incident was a result of an accident. It's quite rare that fallen trees could disrupt power supply. Of course in such increment weather brought about by typhoon signal number 10, of course anything might happen. I think what we are trying to look at is, you have this incident, how can we put the safety of the passengers as the first priority, and secondly, to make sure they know what's happened. So in terms of communication, in terms of the post-incident arrangements, of course we will look carefully into what have been done by the MTRCL, and if there are any inadequacies, of course we have to take lessons from that.
Reporter: Is it already appearing to be that there may have had certain problems? And if so, what does it appear, without blaming, what does it appear those problems were?
Secretary for Transport and Housing: I suppose, because the disruption came rather suddenly, and we were, the whole city was in a period of very bad weather, so in my view, the staff of the MTRCL, the frontline staff, they have tried their best to cope with the crisis, and there are things that were rather unexpected to them. So they have tried their best to cope with the crisis, they have made some announcements, maybe the announcements could be made louder, the communication could be done better. But we have to look carefully into the report to be submitted by the MTRCL to see whether there is room for improvement.
Reporter: How soon after the power interruption occurred that the government became aware there would going to be a delay?
Secretary for Transport and Housing: The government of course realised that there would be delay because the MTRCL has to inform the government of any incident involve, particularly involving disruption of service.
Reporter: How soon between the interruption and your knowledge? What's the gap?
Deputy Commissioner for Transport: It's within the agreed mechanism.
Reporter: Which means what?
Deputy Commissioner for Transport: Within 8 minutes.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Issued at HKT 22:35
NNNN
