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SCMP Reporter

EVERY day, someone dies on Hong Kong's roads. And in the first six months of this year, 1,673 crashes resulted in death or serious injuries.

  Many accidents were caused by speeding, mechanical failure, pedestrians, recklessness or carelessness, but no one knows how many were the fault of drunk drivers heading home after one - or several - too many.

  For Hong Kong is one of the few places in the developed world with no mandatory test for drivers suspected of being ''over the limit''.

  And no one, the police included, has the right to make drivers take a breath or urine test.

  The driver's right to refuse applies even if someone has been killed and the suspicion that the person behind the wheel is unfit to drive is strong.

  This was the case almost two years ago when a police Land-Rover hit four-year-old Leung Way-hung as he walked along Shing Tak Street, Ma Tau Wai, with his brother Kim-hung, eight, and their 70-year-old grandfather, Lee Sum-chuen.

  All three were knocked down on what should have been a short stroll home on a late summer afternoon in September 1992.

  Way-hung spent 18 days on a respirator in Queen Elizabeth Hospital after the vehicle drove through a section of the street reserved for busses.

  He never regained consciousness and eventually doctors switched off his life support machine.

  The driver, Sergeant Tsui Siu-kuen, was fined $4,000, given a three-month suspended jail sentence and disqualified for two years for reckless driving.

  A drink-driving charge was dropped when no evidence was offered because Tsui exercised his legal right to refuse a breath test after the accident.

  No one, bar Tsui, who afterwards sought psychiatric treatment and then left the force, knows if he was intoxicated.

  He admitted having had three beers at lunchtime that day but whether the alcohol was still in his bloodstream and affected his judgment when he hit Way-hung is a matter of conjecture.

  The boy's mother, Eva Leung Lee Lan-lan, was outraged with the $4,000 fine for the life of her son and said the law was ''ridiculous''.

  Then in May 1993, a speeding car ploughed into a concrete divider in Aberdeen Tunnel killing the driver, Chiu Yuk-man, 42, and four passengers. Police said Chiu had a ''high blood-alcohol level''.

  One of the territory's best-known drink-driving cases came 10 years ago with the trial of Dennis Chiu Tat-shing, son of businessman Deacon Chiu Te-ken.

  Chiu, then 24 and a director of ATV, was arrested after Police Constable Cheng Man-fai was crushed to death while trying to stop his car.

  Chiu claimed he was too drunk to remember what happened during the incident in Princess Margaret Road on June 14, 1983.

  The following year he was sentenced to four years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter. However, a charge of driving under the influence of alcohol was dropped.

  These incidents and others like them highlight a problem which seemed, until recently, to be growing with no equivalent progress in prevention and prosecution.

  However, it looks as if things - and the law - may be changing.

  The current legislation has left police hamstrung. And as a result, only 39 prosecutions were brought for driving under the influence last year, 20 in 1992 and even fewer in 1991.

  But a growing number of people believe this figure fails to illustrate the real number of accidents and other offences resulting from drink-driving.

  Police post-mortem examinations over the past five years show up to seven per cent of drivers killed in accidents had a blood-alcohol level above the British limit - 80 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood - the standard likely to be adopted here under proposed new moves.

  Last year, road safety campaigners slammed Hong Kong's drink-driving laws as outdated and inadequate and called for them to be amended.

  However, a year-long government study was abandoned after three months because of a lack of resources and manpower, heightening the frustration of those who want to act against offenders.

  However, last month, Chief Superintendent Cheung Chi-shum, head of the traffic wing, revealed that the police had put forward plans to end drivers' legal right to refuse a drink test.

  And now a powerful lobby of legislators, police, transport and medical experts, many of them on a government working group on the drink-driving issue, are on the verge of introducing the landmark changes.

  The changes are expected early next year after they go before the Legislative Council and the Executive Council.

  ''The law is so outdated it is virtually a mockery of the law,'' said group member Dr Mong Hoi-keung, deputy chairman of the Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM).

  Dr Mong said physicians were being asked to test drivers admitted to hospital after an accident for alcohol levels and then determine whether the person was competent enough to drive.

  He said the IAM, which uses the slogan ''drinking not driving, and driving not drinking'', fully supports the proposals and that the review is urgently needed if the law is to be enforced.

  ''The idea of the breathalyser is preventative rather than punitive,'' Dr Mong said. ''No one will be prosecuted for failing a roadside test.'' THE Hong Kong Automobile Association says the change is long overdue. ''The police have been fighting this with a piece of legislation that is absolutely useless. I am surprised they have been able to get any convictions at all,'' says its spokesman Andrew Windebank.

  ''Hong Kong is not a Third World country and when you mix alcohol with vehicles you get accidents.''   Mr Windebank said the association would not like a breath test introduced but would support a ''zero limit'', making it illegal for motorists to consume any alcohol before driving. However, this is understood to be thought too harsh, hence the move towards the British standard.

  Transport Department Road Safety and Standards Division chief engineer, Brian Carter, who is also chairman of the working group, said this was one of a number of criteria that had been looked into over two years.

  Mr Carter said the proposals, which were put together by the working group and approved by the Road Safety Council, were being finalised by the law-drafting division.

  ''When the legislation is approved, a 'screening breath test' will be carried out at the roadside,'' Mr Carter said.

  ''If it indicates that a person is over the limit the person will be taken to a police station where he will undergo an accurate breath test. The results of the second test will be used in any prosecution.

  ''I think everyone is keen on anything that can be done to enhance road safety.''   There was a feeling Hong Kong should join developed countries in this.

  But Miriam Lau Kin-yee, chairman of the Legislative Council Transport Panel, said the panel had yet to be informed of the moves and would like to see more data on the scale of the problem before any laws were passed for private vehicles.

  ''As far as public transport, especially taxis and mini buses, is concerned the restrictions should be extremely tight. But I would like more information for private drivers and to have discussions with the administration,'' she said.

  ''I am going to keep an open mind on private cars but I wouldn't want to be endorsing drunk drivers.''   Experts believe an average person would be over the limit if he drinks two units - two half pints, two glasses of wine or two measures of spirits - in one hour and one drink each subsequent hour.

  The new proposals could mean people who have had up to three drinks before driving face the risk of being breathalysed and banned.

  Acting Superintendent Jamie Gill, who was involved with the collection of data on drink levels from dead drivers, said there was an exponential increase in accidents when the alcohol-blood level went over the 80-100 mg limit.

  ''If you have 50 mg or less of alcohol to blood the accident rate is not distinguishable from people who have not been drinking,'' he said. ''But the chances of being involved in an accident when you are over 80 mg are double.''   Current legislation states that a driver convicted on indictment of being ''under the influence of drink or drugs to such an extent as to be incapable of having proper control of the motor vehicle'' faces up to three years in jail and a fine of $20,000.

  First offenders on summary conviction face fines up to $10,000 and six months in jail, while repeat drink-drivers are stripped of their licences for a minimum of two years. They also face 12 months in prison and a $15,000 fine.



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