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The Marine Department’s unverified digital outsourcing supervision is useless?

2020-11-28T17:17:39.054Z


The Audit Commission issued two audit reports on Wednesday (25th), which included audits on the "Marine Department's collection and cleaning of marine garbage" and "Government's response to coastal garbage". The report found that the Marine Department


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Written by: Commentary Editing Room

2020-11-27 18:00

Last update date: 2020-11-27 18:00

The Audit Commission issued two audit reports on Wednesday (25th), which included audits on the "Marine Department's collection and cleaning of marine garbage" and "Government's response to coastal garbage".

The report found that the Marine Department's supervision of contractors is insufficient. The garbage collection figures of contractors differ by 100,000 metric tons from the EPD's income. In addition, various government departments have weak enforcement against coastal garbage. The problem of marine garbage in Hong Kong is worrying.

Since the Marine Department fully outsourced marine garbage cleaning and disposal services in 2005, the Marine Department has not verified the contractor's collection statistics, resulting in a significant difference between the reported figures and the actual waste disposal volume of the Environmental Protection Department.

(Profile picture)

Outsourcing supervision is useless

Since the Marine Department fully outsourced marine garbage cleaning and disposal services in 2005, the Marine Department has not verified the contractor's collection statistics, resulting in a significant difference between the reported figures and the actual waste disposal volume of the Environmental Protection Department.

The Audit Commission found that from 2012 to 2019, only 19.9% ​​of the amount of municipal solid waste collected by the contractor recorded by the Environmental Protection Agency was the amount of marine garbage collected in the Marine Department’s control staff report.

The contractor’s waste disposal volume is suspected to be "reported to a large number", reflecting that the Marine Department has not even been able to grasp the actual performance of the contractor. How can government departments talk about supervision?

According to the current tender documents of the territory-wide waters contract (from October 2017 to September 2022), if a tenderer wants to sub-contract the content of the contract, the tenderer should submit the information of the sub-contractor together.

The contractor will not be awarded the service until it obtains the prior written consent of the government.

However, the contractor did not obtain prior written consent when subcontracting services, nor did it notify the Marine Department of relevant matters.

For two of these contracts, the Marine Department only learned of the relevant arrangements 29 and 22 months after the subcontracting took effect, and the contract supervision was useless.

In order to reduce Hong Kong’s marine garbage, all government departments need to actively combat illegal waste disposal.

(Data Picture/Photo by Huang Weimin)

Follow up the performance of outsourcing and strengthen law enforcement

In order to improve the quality of outsourcing services, the government is engaged in pre-examination, supervision during the service period, and even post-event performance management. It requires a multi-pronged approach to strengthen follow-up.

Taking the Marine Department as an example, government departments should at least grasp the actual performance of the service contractor, verify whether the service contractor’s performance is as expected, and then give an overall rating to the contractor’s service quality afterwards, and in the future when bidding again, the last service Consider the overall quality of the contractor.

In addition, the audit report also found that various government departments have limited enforcement of maritime waste.

Although the Marine Department is responsible for the collection of floating garbage in Hong Kong, the coastal garbage is handled by other departments such as the Fisheries and Conservation Department, the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department and the Leisure and Cultural Services Department.

The government needs to improve the quality supervision of the existing outsourcing system, but the government departments themselves still need to exercise their responsibilities.

From 2010 to 2019, the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department only took enforcement actions on 5 cases of littering of waste along the coast each year. The AFCD only took enforcement actions in 3 of the 10 years, and the Leisure and Cultural Services Department only gave verbal advice. .

Compared with the environmental protection agency's record of approximately 25,000 metric tons of marine garbage collected during the same period, the government's law enforcement is close to passing.

In order to reduce Hong Kong’s marine garbage, all government departments need to actively combat illegal waste disposal.

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New Crown Pneumonia Marine Department Audit Report 01 Viewpoint

Source: hk1

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