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Tai Po fire probe: Senior surveyor admits gov’t unit gave advance notice before site inspections
A senior surveyor at a government inspection unit has admitted alerting the renovation consultant ahead of site checks at Wang Fuk Court before the estate went up in flames, a public inquiry has heard.
Victor Dawes, lead counsel to the independent committee investigating the fatal fire, questioned Andy Ku, a senior maintenance surveyor at the Housing Bureau’s Independent Checking Unit (ICU), on Wednesday.
Dawes presented to the committee Ku’s written witness statement, in which the senior surveyor said that the ICU had “no particular role in reviewing or confirming the quality, reliability, and integrity of consultants.”
The committee earlier heard in March that one of the directors of Will Power Architects, the consultancy firm overseeing the large-scale maintenance work at the Tai Po housing estate, had not carried out his duties as a “registered inspector” (RI).
“The RI’s work, in effect, is to act as a regulator. If it’s not up to you to keep them in check, who else would it be?” Dawes asked Ku.
Ku replied that the oversight system is essentially “self-regulating” and that the ICU does not have a formal auditing system.
The committee also heard on Wednesday that for most of its inspections, the ICU had notified a Will Power employee, who was also a representative for the RI. The inspector himself was not there for most of the ICU checks.
Dawes remarked that the ICU’s inspection practice deviated from the norm with other government departments, such as the Labour Department and Buildings Department.
The lead counsel also told the hearing that the ICU had conducted a total of 10 inspections at Wang Fuk Court, of which only two were held without advance notice. One of those two inspections was an impromptu check, which Ku conducted himself after a medical appointment in the same district.
“If you didn’t have a medical appointment in Tai Po that day, there wouldn’t have been an inspection?” Dawes asked. Ku agreed.
Dawes then showed the committee screenshots of ICU maintenance surveyor Amanda Lau’s text conversations scheduling an inspection with the RI representative, who then alerted the contractor, Prestige Construction & Engineering. Ku confirmed that Lau acted on his orders.
After the fire, the ICU began conducting inspections without advance notice, Ku said.
Dawes asked if the new arrangements meant that the ICU realised there were issues with its old system. Ku replied: “There was room for improvement.”
Scaffolding nets, foam boards
Ku was also grilled on his unit’s oversight of scaffolding nets and foam boards, which a preliminary investigation has blamed for contributing to the spread of the blaze.
The lead counsel brought up the ICU’s checks on the fire retardancy of scaffolding nets used at Wang Fuk Court.
He asked Ku why he told the Buildings Department the nets were up to standard, despite the ICU’s own test showing the nets continued to burn for more than 10 seconds before the flame was extinguished.
Ku said that upon two retrials of the same piece of netting, the net did not catch fire.
Dawes showed a fire retardancy certificate to the committee and asked Ku whether the ICU could verify the legitimacy of the certificate and whether it really corresponded to the same lot of scaffold nets.
Ku said the unit could not verify, as it relied on the contractor’s word.
Despite residents’ complaints, the senior surveyor told the hearing that he did not notice the estate’s windows were covered with foam boards during an ICU inspection in September because scaffolding nets were in the way.
A month later, the contractor and the inspector told Ku that only three floors would have windows covered with foam boards whenever spalling works were carried out.
Ku said he did not ask to see a fire retardancy certificate for the foam boards as he believed the phased arrangement would mitigate fire risks. “There was no basis to ask for a certificate,” he said.
Dawes scrolled through about a dozen photos from the site, most of which showed windows covered with foam boards in clear view. The photos were part of a slideshow report that Ku had previously seen.
Dawes questioned how Ku could have been unaware of the foam boards, to which the government surveyor said he was “focused on the concrete works.”
Ku added that in retrospect, he “had been lied to” and that he did not follow up on the matter because there were no further complaints from residents.
