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GOVERNMENT engineers and managers have come under attack for allegedly failing to spend the billions allocated to them by not getting projects going on time.

  ''If I had my way we'd simply sack the lot of them,'' said one senior official closely involved in drawing up last week's Budget.

   Even Financial Secretary Mr Hamish Macleod, always a cautious speaker, made clear how unhappy he was at such a turn of events.

  ''Such delays are not acceptable,'' he said. ''This means some desirable projects will not be ready on time.''   Mr Macleod had good cause to be angry. Last year he promised such a shortfall would not be allowed to happen again after a similar slip-up.

  Now it has recurred and allowed legislators, unable to find much to criticise on other fronts of the surprisingly successful Budget, to focus their fire on the $7 billion underspending.

  The finger of blame has even been pointed in Secretary for Work Mr James Blake's direction.

  ''It is sheer bloody incompetence,'' said Co-operative Resources Centre spokesman Mr Ronald Arculli, who intends to pursue the matter in Legco this week.

  ''The people of Hongkong are being shortchanged by these delays.''   United Democrats spokesman Mr Albert Chan Wai-yip said the shortfall showed many civil servants did not care if projects were delayed.

  Some even hinted heads might have to roll. ''I don't know if it's a man or a system, but something has got to be done,'' said independent Mr Vincent Cheng Hoi-chuen.

  And, Mr Macleod yesterday made clear he sympathised with such views, although he stopped short of talk of dismissals.

  ''If, year after year, a department gets it wrong, something has to be done,'' the Financial Secretary said, without referring to any particular branch of the administration.

  ''There should be someone in Government who is responsible for the project and gets a glow of satisfaction if it is completed on time and a kick, to put it crudely, if it is not.''   Yet Mr Blake showed no sign of feeling under fire last week during an interview with the Sunday Morning Post.

  Instead he made clear he was ready to quit if necessary. ''If there is anyone who can do the job better, then let him come forward,'' he said.

  He also offered a vigorous defence of his branch, hinting that legislators and other Government sections should shoulder part of the responsibility.

  ''The move towards accountability has brought with it the need to adopt systems which constrain productivity,'' Mr Blake said, referring to the greater autonomy given to individual Government departments, as well as the emergence of an increasingly assertive Legco.

  Mr Blake and his subordinates are able to dodge much of the blame because they are not directly responsible for thousands of Government projects run by up to 10 different departments.

  But that is about to change, with the Secretary of Works being put in full charge of all public works.

  There is unlikely to be an immediate solution, despite a much-touted new computer co-ordination program. Although some improvements have already been made, other key measures will not come into effect until December.

  In the meantime, some are already talking of handing over almost half of public works projects to the private sector.

  ''All this talk about computer programs is essentially irrelevant,'' said one official. ''The role of Government in construction is just going to diminish from now on. We'll leave them to get on with what they can and farm the rest out to the private sector.''   The first detailed breakdown of the $7 billion shortfall shows the full extent of the problem to be faced.

  Mr Blake refused to single out individual projects that had contributed to the shortfall, saying hundreds were involved.

  But he disclosed the total underspending attributable to works-related departments was $4.9 billion - with the remaining $2 billion caused by delays in buying land needed for some projects.

  Of that $4.9 billion, $1.3 billion was caused by lower tender prices and unused contingency funds representing genuine savings - although they were partly the result of delays in other Government projects, which meant tighter competition for the few contracts available.

  But it is the remainder of the shortfall Mr Macleod found unacceptable.

  Delays in projects already underway accounted for $0.9 billion. However tight controls have been put in place to stop projects already started from slowing down, and this part of the shortfall should be reduced in the coming year.

  Elsewhere problems remain. Another $1.1 billion was mostly caused by red tape, and a further $1.6 billion was due to changes in Government programmes before they went out to tender, something Mr Macleod said must stop.

  ''You can't keep on changing the requirements. There comes a time when you have to say that's what we want and let's get on with it . . . that's the culture we want,'' he said.



Finger of blame points at public works public works