Time to stop the bureaucratic buck-passing

'The last thing the public wants to hear is a response from a department which says something is someone else's job.' This crisp remark, which sums up one of the frustrations people have with our bureaucracy, was made by Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen.

He was exhorting civil servants to concentrate on teamwork and efficient communication in an interview with the Civil Service Newsletter in August. Mr Tsang said he hoped to deliver a 'can-do' spirit among civil servants by the end of his two-year term.

The chief executive, a veteran public servant, is well placed to make such observations. But Mr Tsang would be disappointed if he reads the latest reports by the ombudsman. They reveal that 'buck-passing' remains a problem in some departments.

The Lands and Housing departments, for example, stalled for almost two years when handling a complaint about an unauthorised structure. They were convinced the structure in question would eventually be made legal, and both tried to find excuses for doing nothing about it. In the end, the structure was not made legal.

Now, the departments are finally getting around to having it demolished. This should have been done long ago. As the ombudsman noted, this was not the first time the Lands and Housing departments have procrastinated. No wonder unauthorised structures keep appearing in Hong Kong, despite official pledges to eliminate them.

Similarly, an investigation into a complaint against the Office of the Telecommunications Authority showed it had been passive in discharging its duties. The complainant was concerned that a flat adjacent to his own was rented out for the purpose of installing a mobile telephone station. While the main thrust of the complaint - concerns about radiation risk and fire safety - was unsubstantiated, the ombudsman found that Ofta was far too passive in enforcing the rules. As the primary authority for approving such stations, it took no action to check if the operators had obtained the necessary approval from other departments, and did not accept responsibility for rejecting the application or imposing penalties for non-compliance with the other departments' requirements.