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Following is a question by the Dr Hon Kwok Ka-ki and a written reply by the Secretary for Transport and Housing, Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung, in the Legislative Council today (April 29):
Question:
It has been reported that early this month, a bus of New Lantao Bus Company (1973) Limited (Lantao Bus Company) with 60 passengers on board had an accident, which was suspected to have been caused by failure of its braking system, when it was travelling down a slope on its way from Tung Chung to Tai O, and it nearly fell off the hill. Some residents of Lantau Island have relayed to me that as the buses of Lantao Bus Company are their major means of transport and many tourists take the buses of Lantao Bus Company to tour around various tourist spots on Lantau Island at the weekends, they are particularly concerned about the aforesaid accident. Regarding the road safety of franchised buses, will the Government inform this Council:
(1) whether it knows the details of the system adopted by Lantao Bus Company at present for examining the driving skills and behaviour of its bus drivers; whether the authorities carried out regular and surprise inspections in the past three years in respect of the road safety of buses of Lantao Bus Company; if they did, of the respective numbers and results of these two types of inspections, and whether they uncovered any breaches of traffic rules (e.g. speeding and failing to comply with traffic signals) by bus drivers; if they did, of the number of such cases; and
(2) as some bus drivers have relayed to me that franchised bus companies from time to time arrange their bus drivers to carry out duties as "relief drivers" so as to save expenditure on drivers' overtime pay, whether the authorities have looked into the prevalence of such arrangement at present and its impact on the rest time of bus drivers and road safety; if they have, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Reply:
President,
The Government has all along been attaching great importance to driving safety. With regard to franchised buses, the Transport Department (TD) and the franchised bus companies have implemented appropriate measures in various areas like the rest time arrangement for bus captains, driving skills and vehicle inspection, with a view to ensuring the driving safety of franchised buses.
My reply to the Dr Hon Kwok Ka-ki's question is as follows:
(1) According to the Road Traffic Ordinance, all franchised bus captains must pass the TD's driving test and hold a valid driving licence for "Public Bus" or "Public Bus - Franchised" for driving franchised buses. Moreover, the franchised bus companies have provided various types of training to their regular and part-time bus captains. With regard to the New Lantao Bus Company (1973) Ltd. (NLB), all newly-recruited bus captains must have passed the TD's driving test prior to the employment and hold a valid driving licence. They would receive training for three to five days provided by the company to learn and familiarise themselves with the bus operation, road conditions of bus routes and the location of bus stops en route. Moreover, the NLB would arrange bus captains to attend road safety courses and seminars so as to enhance their road safety awareness.
With regard to monitoring the driving skill and behaviour of bus captains, the NLB has installed an electronic tachogragh (commonly known as "black box") on its whole fleet to record the operational data of vehicles such as journey speed, time and details, etc. Such record can help monitor the bus captains' behaviour and investigate accidents. The NLB would also conduct surprise inspections from time to time at different road sections and take appropriate disciplinary action against bus captains with improper driving behaviour. Over the past three years, the NLB was involved in about 50 traffic accidents, accounting for less than 0.8% of the total franchised bus traffic accidents (NLB fleet makes up of about 2% of the total franchised bus fleet); and its accident rate per million vehicle-kilometre is lower than that of the overall rate of franchised buses. During the same period, the NLB has conducted over 130 surprise inspections and four bus captains were given verbal warning due to slight speeding. Moreover, the police would initiate prosecution action against drivers who violate traffic regulations. Over the past three years, the NLB bus captains were involved in 13 cases of careless driving.
(2) A franchised bus company has the responsibility to employ sufficient qualified bus captains so as to operate bus services in accordance with the routing, timetable, frequency and bus allocation as stipulated in the Schedule of Service approved by the TD. Similar to other franchised bus companies, apart from employing regular bus captains, the NLB would employ part-time bus captains to meet the needs of daily manpower deployment and additional passenger demand on some specific dates and hours. Such arrangements are not for reducing expenditures on regular drivers' overtime payment. In fact, the employment of part-time bus captains can help reduce the need for regular bus captains to work overtime and can give them sufficient rest time, thereby enhancing driving safety. For the NLB, part-time bus captains are mainly deployed to operate additional bus departures during weekends and holidays to meet extra passenger demand. To enhance monitoring of the manpower situation of bus captains, the franchised bus companies are required to submit monthly reports to TD on the manpower situation of bus captains using a standardised form since the beginning of this year. Should there be any sign of manpower shortage, franchised bus companies will be urged to implement improvement measures as soon as possible.
To ensure that bus captains have sufficient rest time in the interest of driving safety, the TD has issued the Guidelines on Bus Captain Working Hours, Rest Times and Meal Breaks (the Guidelines) (see Annex) for franchised bus companies for arranging work schedules for regular and part-time bus captains. To ensure the compliance of the Guidelines by the franchised bus companies, they are required to submit quarterly reports to the TD on the implementation of the Guidelines. The TD also engages independent contractors to carry out annual compliance surveys on working hours, rest times and meal breaks of bus captains. The report submitted by the NLB and the TD's survey findings both indicate that the NLB has generally complied with the Guidelines in arranging work schedules. The TD will continue to closely monitor the implementation of the Guidelines, and take follow-up action where necessary.
Ends/Wednesday, April 29, 2015
Issued at HKT 13:00
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