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.

Some Wang Fuk Court residents have said they “are given no choice” over the government’s plan to buy back their flats, urging authorities to reconsider rebuilding the fire-hit estate on site.

Residents continued to return to the housing complex in Tai Po on Wednesday, half a year after the massive fire in November, which killed 168 people and displaced thousands. They were permitted to visit their flats for a second time to retrieve personal belongings, following an initial round of trips last month.

Speaking to the media outside the cordoned area, several residents expressed dissatisfaction with the buyback plan. The government has given flat owners until the end of August to accept the offer, while those who opt in before June 30 will be given priority in selecting flats in a special sales scheme.

“We are given no choice,” a Wang Tao House resident surnamed Lee told reporters in Cantonese. “It’s either sell your flat or sell your flat,” she said.

A Wang Shing House resident, surnamed Sze, said his family were inclined to accept the buyback plan, calling it the “only rational option.”

“We have concerns about how to conduct our lives after selling the flat, because it has not been made clear,” Sze told InMedia in Cantonese. “It’s not an easy decision [to sell the flat], but people will understand that, in our situation, we don’t really have many options.”

A Wang Tao House resident, surnamed Lai, criticised the government’s June 30 deadline for early flat selection as “putting the cart before the horse.”

“A sensible way would be to let us pick what we really want to buy, before making us sell the flat,” he told local media outlet The Collective in Cantonese.

Another Wang Shing House resident, identified only as Mrs Wong, similarly slammed the deadlines in the government buyback plan.

“Why do we have to decide before June 30 or the end of August? Why can’t we wait until the report by the independent committee?” she said in Cantonese. She was referring to a public inquiry that is due to report on a range of issues relating to the blaze by September.

She also questioned how the HK$2 billion fire insurance covering Wang Fuk Court would be claimed if the government decided not to rebuild the estate.

“Why can’t you use that HK$2 billion to rebuild? We can wait. I am not dying,” she told The Witness. “But [the government] is not giving us a choice.”

‘Never communicated directly’

Lee, the Wang Tao House resident, said her flat was not affected by the fire and expressed hope that she could live there in the future. She supports the idea of rebuilding the estate, she added.

She also called on the government-appointed administrator, Hop On Management, to organise an owners’ meeting to facilitate communication and improve transparency.

Wang Tao House resident Lai also appealed for an owners’ meeting, saying it would allow residents to communicate their preferences regarding the government buyback plan as well as to communicate directly with the government.

“Often, residents’ voices are only heard through the media. In fact, the government has never communicated with us directly,” he said.

More residents have been calling on the government to reconsider rebuilding Wang Fuk Court in media interviews. Some have also expressed this wish through handmade posters and drawings displayed in their flats’ windows.

The second round of visits will run until May 29. It is unclear whether residents will be allowed to make more trips in the future.

The authorities have said the buyback plan is final. So far, there have been no announcements regarding the arrangements for those choosing not to accept the buyback offers.

Deputy Financial Secretary Michael Wong said in February that the government would study whether “special legislation” would be needed if some owners refused to sell their flats.

A former head of the government’s housing checking unit has said he was “unaware” that his surveyors notified contractors ahead of inspections at Wang Fuk Court, the site of Hong Kong’s deadliest fire in decades.

Rudolf Lau, who headed the Housing Bureau’s Independent Checking Unit (ICU) when the tragedy struck, testified on Friday, the 24th day of hearings into the cause of the massive blaze.

Just two days earlier, Andy Ku, a senior ICU maintenance surveyor, told the independent committee investigating the fire that the unit had alerted the renovation consultant ahead of site checks before the Tai Po housing estate went up in flames in November.

Victor Dawes, lead counsel for the committee, had previously said that the inspection unit’s alerts may have tipped off the construction firm and given it opportunities to conceal wrongdoing.

Lau, who retired in February, was asked by Jason Yu, counsel for the committee, on Friday whether he was aware of the advance notices, local media reported. Lau replied that he was “unaware” of the practice.

‘By the book’

Yu also grilled Lau on the ICU’s regulatory role, asking the reason for the unit’s oversights. Lau said the unit’s monitoring regime for minor works relied on contractors and consultants to self-regulate, as well as on complaints from residents.

Yu challenged him, saying that unscrupulous individuals responsible for the maintenance works would not report themselves.

“Did the ICU leave the responsibility for inspection to residents?” Yu asked, noting that an average resident would not have been able to spot irregularities such as illegally altered windows and fire escape openings.

Lau admitted there were blind spots in the unit’s regulatory regime but said it had reviewed its system since the Wang Fuk Court fire by conducting unannounced inspections.

The former ICU head was also questioned about an inspection requirement that the unit was not made aware of until after the fire. Asked whether the ICU operated only “by the book,” blindly following Buildings Department (BD) protocols, Lau answered in the affirmative.

“The [BD] manual did not require on-site safety inspections, so we did not do them,” he said.

Wrapping up Friday’s hearing, committee chair David Lok said the government’s cross-departmental investigation report will be published on the committee’s website by May 15. The next round of hearings will continue after mid-June, he added.

A maintenance project at the fire-hit Wang Fuk Court should have been classified as high risk, but was instead categorised as minor works requiring no regular inspections, a government surveyor has told a public inquiry.

Nick Yung, a senior maintenance surveyor at the Housing Bureau’s Independent Checking Unit (ICU), gave his testimony before an independent committee investigating the massive blaze at the Tai Po housing estate on Thursday.

He was the second ICU official questioned by Victor Dawes, lead counsel for the committee, after senior maintenance surveyor Andy Ku on Wednesday.

Yung said that the maintenance project on the outer walls of all eight buildings at Wang Fuk Court was classified as low risk for the convenience of homeowners, which created a “loophole” in safety regulation, local media reported.

The surveyor said the renovation project should have been considered high risk, as it involved work on the entire outer wall of each building. However, because it was classified as minor works, it did not warrant regular inspections.

The ICU only conducts inspections when complaints are received, Yung added.

Extensive repairs on the exterior of the Tai Po estate were under way when the fire broke out in late November, ripping through seven of its eight buildings. The blaze, which killed 168 people and displaced thousands of residents, was the city’s deadliest fire since 1948.

Combustible wooden boards

During previous hearings, the committee heard that the removal and replacement of fireproof stairwell windows and fire escape doors with combustible wooden boards may have breached fire safety rules and allowed smoke to enter and spread rapidly in the building.

But Yung told the inquiry on Thursday that he had mistaken the wooden boards for a protective measure to cover damaged windows.

That prompted Dawes to point out that windows on every fifth floor were replaced and asked why Yung did not find it suspicious that so many windows had been damaged.

The surveyor replied that not all the windows had been removed.

Yung said that the ICU relied on the contractors to self-regulate and admitted that the unit’s review mechanism was “very problematic.”

Dawes said, “If even professionals fail to detect these safety issues, how can you expect residents to notice that there are problems? How could an ordinary person know that this is such a serious issue?”

Yung said the openings were not clear in photos but admitted they would have been visible if seen directly on site. Dawes responded: “Exactly, but you didn’t go down there yourselves.”

The surveyor also told the committee that it was only in January – more than a month after the fire – that the ICU was notified by the Buildings Department of “a new policy,” which came into effect in 2023, requiring random inspections of 20 per cent of minor works.

The ICU would have followed up if it had been aware of the arrangement, Yung said.

“It feels to us as though you are shirking responsibility,” said Judge David Lok, who chairs the committee.

Yung denied Lok’s contention, saying he only meant that the ICU would have had the opportunity to conduct inspections if it had been aware of the new policy.

The Hong Kong government said it has issued buyback offer letters to homeowners of the fire-hit Wang Fuk Court, moving forward with its plan to acquire property titles from displaced residents.

The government said on Thursday that it has distributed “letters of offer” to flat owners of the seven blocks affected in the massive inferno in November that killed 168 people – Hong Kong’s deadliest blaze in decades.

The move follows the authorities’ announcement in February that they would spend up to HK$6.8 billion to buy back flats from owners. The budget consists of HK$4 billion in taxpayers’ money and HK$2.8 billion from a support fund largely made up of public donations.

Owners can choose cash or a flat swap for a new government-subsidised unit under a special sales scheme, according to the February plan.

The government has established a company named Wang Fuk Court Property Rights Acquisition Limited, which has distributed the offer letters to owners, it said on Thursday.

Owners have until August 31 to sign a “letter of acceptance” enclosed with the offer letter and return it to the company if they choose to accept the acquisition, it said.

“Upon receipt of the owners’ duly signed ‘Letter of Acceptance,’ the government will make every effort to promptly assist in completing the Agreement for Sale and Purchase and the [Deed of] Assignment,” a government spokesperson said in a statement.

Early flat selection

For owners who opt for cash, authorities will expedite the payment for them to make purchases in the private market, the government said.

Those who want to participate in the government’s special sales scheme will be allowed to select their flats earlier if they accept the buyback offer quickly, authorities added.

They will receive priority if they return the letter of acceptance by June 30.

For homeowners of Wang Chi House, the only block not affected by the blaze, the government said that if 75 per cent of owners sign the letter of acceptance by June 30, the buyback plan will be made available to them. The government previously said buying out Wang Chi House would require an additional HK1 billion.

The Thursday statement did not mention what arrangements were available for those choosing not to accept the government’s buyback offers.

Amid calls from some residents for the housing estate to be rebuilt at its original location, the government has said that the buyback plan is final.

Authorities said the seven towers hit by flames suffered “irreversible” internal damage, and that they would be torn down to build a park or other community facilities.

However, some residents expressed scepticism about the government’s proposal after a public inquiry into the fire revealed that damage was concentrated in a number of buildings.

Some residents also expressed a desire to return to the estate after they were allowed to return to their homes to retrieve their personal belongings and found their flats largely unscathed, according to local media.

Deputy Financial Secretary Michael Wong, who is leading the buyback plan, said in February that the government would study whether “special legislation” would be needed if some owners refuse to sell their flats.

Hong Kong authorities cannot rule out theft in 16 of 142 lost property reports filed by residents of the fire-ravaged Wang Fuk Court housing estate, the security minister has said.

Secretary for Security Chris Tang said on an RTHK programme on Saturday that in 48 cases, the police and the residents were able to retrieve the missing items.

“About 20 per cent [of the reports] concerned flats that were severely burned, for which we, as well as the residents, believe the items had likely been incinerated,” Tang said in Cantonese. “In 30 per cent of cases, the residents could not clearly describe the items, making it difficult to follow up.”

But Tang said in the remaining 16 cases, the missing items might have been stolen, and that police were investigating.

Wang Fuk Court residents were allowed to return to their homes twice since April to collect personal belongings, months after a massive inferno in November ripped through seven blocks of the Tai Po housing estate, killing 168 people and displacing others.

The entire estate’s eight blocks have been cordoned off by the authorities since the blaze. Some residents raised alarms about a possible security loophole as they suspected valuable items at their homes had been stolen.

In March, weeks before residents made their first home trips, police arrested three men hired to carry out reinforcement works at Wang Fuk Court for allegedly stealing jewellery from unoccupied flats. Authorities said they had stepped up security at the estate since then.

Increased emergency hotlines

Tang also said on the Saturday programme that the Fire Services Department (FSD) had increased its emergency phone lines from 30 to 48 in recent months, with the figure expected to reach nearly 70 in the next two to three months.

After the FSD completes its command system upgrade early next year, there will be 100 available hotlines, Tang added.

The public inquiry into the blaze previously heard that hundreds of emergency calls during the fire had overloaded the FSD’s system, leading to backlogged calls and failed connections. In one case, a woman died after the police failed to pass her call to the FSD.

Tang said on Saturday that the 30-line system had been enough for handling fires in the past until the Tai Po blaze.

“We realised 30 lines were not enough in an event like this, so we felt the need to immediately increase that. But we have to strike a balance between resources and needs, and we think that 100 lines will be enough,” Tang said.

He also mentioned the government’s proposal to revamp the city’s fire safety laws, saying it aims at ensuring the FSD has the “final responsibility” in the oversight of buildings’ fire risks.

After the revamp, the FSD will actively refer structural fire hazards, such as exit points for workers in a building’s fire staircase, to the responsible departments and follow up on the matter, Tang said.

The proposed amendments will cover the Fire Services Ordinance and three subsidiary pieces of legislation on fire safety equipment in buildings, the professionals who oversee them, and the FSD’s powers to abate fire hazards, the government announced last week.

A one-month public consultation regarding the proposed revamp is underway. Residents have until June 25 to submit their views in writing.