The overall crime-detection rate in the first half of this year fell to the lowest level in eight years, and police said this was due to a dip in crimes that usually had a high detection rate.
Announcement of the 40.6 per cent detection rate - down 1.6 per cent year on year and the lowest since 2003 - follows complaints from police unions about low morale and a heavy workload. However, the force said this was not a factor and a union said complaints had dropped off in recent months.
'The main reason for the drop in the detection rate is a decrease in cases with higher detection rates, including wounding, serious assault, indecent assault and serious drug cases,' crime and security director Stephen Lo Wai-chung, said.
A police spokeswoman said that there could be multiple reasons for the lower figure, including how co-operative residents were in reporting cases, and said it had nothing to do with detectives' manpower.
In the first half of this year police unions and frontline detectives said they could not cope with a growing caseload and the force introduced several measures in April, including more justification for overtime payments and accelerating the transfer of officers to the detective force.
Police Inspectors' Association chairman Benjamin Tsang Chiu-fo said the union had received no more complaints from detectives since the measures were enacted.
After the previous low of 39.2 per cent in 2003, the detection rate from 2004 to 2009 ranged between 43.6 per cent and 45.6 per cent.