POLS 7050

Public Administration

Case Paper

LO, Kam-wah(09425616)

TANG, Wai-yip(09409564)

Red-top minibus ran on pedestrian and the driver finally convicted guilty in the court.

(Video taken by others and put on you tube)

Three people died at the scene and a fourth in hospital on 25 July 2009 in a Yuen

Long crach involving a minibus and a container truck.

(Green-top minibus after the accident)

According to the reports from the Police, there were 1118 and 1017 minibus

related accidents occurred in 2007 and 2008. Among them, 17 people died and 899

injured in 2007 and 14 people died and 1603 injured in 2008 respectively. The issue

was attached great importance during the years. The government officials and

Transport Advisory Committee were discussing that issue since 2002 and aimed at

coping with the fatal accidents of minibuses resulting from speeding. Measures were

introduced to tackle with the problem. For instance, to enhance the safety of

passengers, public light buses registered on or after 1 August 2004 were required to be

fitted with passenger seat belts and high-back seats. Besides, on 1 May 2008, public

light minibuses were required to be fitted with an approved speed display device and

no alteration is allowed. The objectives were to enhance the hardware of minibuses in

order to reduce the number of accidents and improve the road safety. However, the

fatal accidents still occurred nearly once a month. Annual report of Transport

Complaints Unit in 2008 pointed out that about 57% and 79% of comlpaints received

related to imporper driving behaviour, misconduct and poor performance of drivers of

green-top minibuses and red-top minibuses. The Government thought that the

drivers’ attitude and speeding were the source of the accidents. In this connection,

three new measures will be launched to further enhance the road safety and response

to the growing public concern over traffic accidents. They are the installation of

Speed Limiter, Black Box and mandatory pre-service training for new minibus

drivers.

Speed LimitersOne of the three measures the Government is going to introduce is the

compulsory installation of speed limiters to all 4,350 public light buses by early 2011.

Speed limiter is a device that main function is to limit the injection of fuel to the

engine to control the maximum speed of the vehicle at the pre-set speed as

stipulated in the license condition. The main objective of this

campaign is to prevent the public light buses from exceeding the

pre-set speed and endangering the road users and the drivers

themselves.

Advantages

As the speed limiters can effectively control the maximum speed of the

minibuses, the drivers will not be able to drive exceeding the set speed. It is believed

that the risk of collision can be reduced when the minibus drivers drive at lower

speeds.

When the minibus drivers cannot exceed the speed limit set by the speed

controllers, it can be believed that the need for the police to assign officers to pretend

normal passengers to collect speeding evidence in the public light buses no longer

exists. Thus the law enforcement cost can be saved for performing other important

duties.

Potential Problems

The speed of the public light bus is critical for the red-top minibus drivers to

maximize the number of trips in limited period of time to enhance their revenue. If

the maximum speed of their red minibuses is limited, the drivers may drive faster in

the non-highways to compensate the speed lost in the highway to maintain the level of

their income. This may increase rather than reduce the risk of traffic accidents.

As a remedy for the income loss from lower maximum speed in highway, the

red-top minibus drivers may also perform some dangerous acts such as dashing

through the cross roads in front of the red traffic lights and allowing the passengers to

get on the minibuses in the restricted areas to increase the number of potential

passengers. Recent news revealed that a red-top minibus driver even drove into the

pedestrian to overtake the vehicles in the front. After the installation of speed

limiters, it can be expected that the red-top minibus drivers may perform more such

dangerous actions to compensate their loss from lower maximum speed.

The suppliers of minibus fed by the liquefied petroleum gas revealed that there

are technical difficulties in adding the speed controllers to such vehicles. This is the

case even in other countries such as Australia and Korea. As there is such loophole in

installation of the speed limiters, some red-top minibus drivers may take this

advantage to shift to drive such vehicles. Also, as the speed limiters can only control

the maximum speed but not the speed levels according to different roads with

different speed limits, they cannot prevent the minibus drivers from speeding in the

roads with lower speed limits. Thus the effectiveness of the new measure will be

seriously affected.

Black BoxBlack box, as the name implies, is a device like what mandatorily installed in the

aircrafts. The rationale and functions of black box in minibuses are the same as that

in the aircrafts. The black box can record the date, time, speed, drivers’ actions and

minibus reactions in order to have better understanding to what happens when

accidents occur just as in the aircrafts.

Advantage

The Transport Department will table a bill to the Legislative Council in the early

2010 and will compel new minibuses to install the black box by adding a clause in

minibus licenses and passenger service licenses. The Government will not mandate

the existing minibuses to install black box due to the technical limitation. Any person

who makes unauthorised alteration to the device which leads to the device not

functions normally, commits an offence and is liable to a fine and imprisonment. The

installation of black box is simple to implement since every newly registered minibus

has to be equipped before put in service. And it is believed that the black box can

prevent the drivers from trying to commit traffic offences.

Potential Problem

Some argue that the installation of black box cannot prevent the accidents caused

by speeding because such device can only provide more information just after the

accidents occurred. Indeed, it is not difficult to find out the reasons for minibus

related accidents even though there is no black box installed. Such device is just a

data-collecting machine which has no effect on driving. The function of this device is

not a precautionary measure. If the drivers believed that they would not encounter

accidents even if they break the traffic rules, their driving attitude will remain.

Pre-service training for new Public Light Bus (PLB) drivers

The Government will introduce a mandatory pre-service training course focusing

on the driving behaviour and attitude of applicants for the minibus driving licenses.

This is a new course apart from PLB Driver Training Course and Driving

Improvement Course. Every driver should finish the pre-service course before getting

the licenses for minibuses. The main aim is to improve the driving attitude of the

minibus drivers. The course emphasized on the road safety, passenger safety, driving

behaviour and attitude, service skills, handling accidents, emergency vehicle control

and road safety regulations.

Advantage

The plan is accepted by different parties since they all believed that the main

reason for the accidents is the attitude of the drivers. Educating the drivers before

they commence the business is a precautionary measure to avoid imporper driving

behaviour and misconduct.

Potential problem

But we should take a more in-depth look at the case. Is there any reason

motivating the drivers to commit traffic offences? Or is there any inducement for

speeding? Improving the driving attitude and behaviour is one of the methods to

enhance road safety. However, if we cannot solve the ultimate problem behind why

there are so many fatal traffic accidents within this industry, the drivers will insist

their driving behaviour even though they understand the importance of the road safety

and good driving attitude.

Main reasons for Traffic accidents One of the real sources of the problems of public light buses is the salary structure

of the red minibuses. At present, the red-top minibus drivers’ income is composed of

an agreed percentage of the remaining of fare revenue after subtracting the cost of

fuel. For those who are both owners and drivers of the red-top minibuses, they take

even all the remaining of the fare revenue by subtracting the fuel and maintenance

costs. This means that the more trips red-top minibus drivers can finish every day, the

more they will earn potentially. This is a great motivation for the red-top minibus

drivers to rush for every trip and manage to maximize the number of trips each day

even by driving in contrary to the traffic laws.

The other real source of the problems is the driving attitude. This is the case for

some of the red-top and green-top minibus drivers. For the red-top minibus drivers,

their driving attitude is usually perverted by the problematic salary structure. For the

green-top minibus drivers, some of them may rush to finish the trips because they

want to get a longer break between the trips. Some of them even take up secret and

illegal part-time job during the non-working hours for extra money. So they may

breach the road traffic laws when it is necessary for finishing such trips more quickly.

For the minibus drivers with bad driving attitude, if they think that they will not

be easily caught by the police or the gain from breaking the traffic laws to increase

their income is larger than the potential loss from being fined for the traffic offence,

the situation will become worse.

Speed Limiters for the Real ProblemsAs we can see that the real problems come from the salary structure and the drive

attitude of the minibus drivers, the installation of speed limiters is not only unable to

solve the real problems but also create new problems. According to the statistics

(Annex 2), the major causes of the traffic accidents are driving too close to the

vehicles in front and careless lane changing rather than speeding. Therefore, speed

limiters do nothing with the major causes of the traffic accidents.

On the other hand, the installation of speed controllers create new potential

problems such as increasing the chances of speeding in non-highways, dashing

through red traffic lights and driving into the restricted areas as mentioned before.

Thus installing speed limiters alone may not be able to solve the real problems.

Black box for the Real ProblemsAs we know the main reasons of traffic accidents, black box installation has only

a limited effect on minibus related accidents. The drivers will still drive exceeding

speed limits on the roads to make more income. They would believe that the device

functions only after accidents occur. Even though there is a traffic accident, black box

only records the time and the speeds of the minibuses. It cannot relate the speeds to

specific roads. It is difficult for the Police to gather sufficient evidences from the

black boxes. Futhermore, the illegal alteration to the device is another problem.

Speed display device is a typical example. According to Road Traffic (Construction

and Maintainence of Vehicles) Regulation, any misuse, malfunction or alertation of

speed display device would constitute an offence. Since the Regulations took effect

on 1 May 2008, no person had been prosecuted for such an offence. In fact, we can

easily find that many speed display devices installed in minibuses are altered. Some

devices could not reflect the actual speeds and some even cannot produce sound when

the speed was over 80 km/hour. Therefore, the effectiveness of the installation of

black box remains a question.

Pre-service training for the Real ProblemsPre-service training course can improve the road safety and minimise minibus

related accidents for a certain extend. Since the attitude and behaviour of minibus

drivers will directly affect their driving habits. The course can provide a correct

concept of road safety and proper driving techniques before they drive the minibuses

on the roads. But the point is that even though they attend the course before service,

would they really follow what they have learnt and strictly adhere to the regulations

on the roads? If we do nothing to the salary structure and the operation mode of the

minibus industry (especially in the red-top minibus industry), the problems still exist

because there is an inducement for them to break traffic rules to make more money.

Alternative Solutions for the real problemsTo solve the complex real problems in reality, we need a combination of

solutions rather than a single one.

Adjusting Salary Structure

Nowadays, out of the 4,350 public light buses in Hong Kong, almost 70% of

them are green-top minibuses and the rest are red-top minibuses. While the drivers of

the former receive fixed salaries from their companies, those of the latter involve in

the profit sharing scheme with the vehicle owners or even operate as a sole

proprietorship. Both of the structures for red-top minibuses are problematic in the

long run. It is because in the profit sharing scheme, what the owners of the vehicles

concern is only how much profit can the drivers make and the owners will usually

reluctant to impose any control on the drivers’ driving behaviour to confine the

profits. The sole proprietorship format is even the time bomb for the road safety. It

makes the drivers operate nearly without any control except from the police. The only

long-term solution to this problem is changing all the red-top minibus to be green-top

ones to put them under the control of the company and the Government. But this

should be done step by step. To attain this goal the Legislative Council should

gradually utilize its power to vote for the reduction of the number of the red-top

minibus licenses and the replacement from the green-top ones for the future extension

periods. The ultimate goal is to replace all the red-top minibuses by the green-top

ones.

External Indictor Lights

Instead of installing speed limiters, we should consider to install the External

Indictor Lights to the minibuses. It is a speed indictor that can reflect the actual range

of speed of the vehicles. The light will be installed on the top of the minibuses and

different lights represent different range of speed. Once the speed is over 80 km/hour,

for example, red light will turn on. It can alert other road users for them to better

assess the road situation. The Police can easily detect the speeding offence. There are

different lights to indicate different ranges of speed of minibuses for the Police to

enforce laws according to speed limits of different roads. The number of speeding

offence will definitely decrease because it is easy to detect who is speeding.

Singapore is one of the countries using this system to cope with speeding problem.

Enhance the passengers’ responsibilities

Passengers also bear repsonsibility on speeding. Many passengers know that

minibus drivers usually drive exceeding speed limits. But this is the reason why some

of them choose to travel with minibuses since they can reach their destination faster.

Passengers will normally not report to the Police when they enjoy the advantage of

speeding but they will blame the drivers once accidents occur. In indeed, it is the

responsibility of the passengers to report speeding cases to the Police. We can

introduce a rewarding system for the complaints leading to successful prosecution of

traffic offence. It can be financed by part of the fine from traffic offences. It can

highly motivate the passengers to report the traffic offence. If the drivers think that it

is highly probable for the passengers to report their misconduct, they will tend to

comply with the laws more strictly.

Increase Penalty for Breach of Traffic Rules

In Hong Kong, it has been introduced a driving-offence points system. Although

the penalties for the driving offences had been increased in the past, it seems not

adequate. According to the Road Traffic Ordinance, the driving-offence point for

failing to comply with traffic signals is 5. As the disobedience to the traffic signal in

the cross roads is especially dangerous and fatal, it is recommended to increase the

driving offence point from 5 to 10 in the cross roads. At the moment, failure to keep a

safe distance from the vehicle in front and changing lane carelessly are the main

causes of multiple and serious collisions. However, the present laws do not specify

any particular offences for such acts and the offenders can only be charged for

careless driving. As the process to collect evidence for careless driving is difficult

and blurred, we recommend the Legislation Council to introduce failing to keep a safe

distance with the vehicles in front and changing lane carelessly as new traffic offences

to enhance the prosecution effectiveness and efficiency. When the minibus drivers

know that their potential gain from breaking the traffic law cannot cover the cost of

being fined, they will be motivated to comply with the laws.

BibliographyLegislative Council Panel on Transport Measures to Enhance Road Safety, LC Paper No.

CB(1)298/04-05(06) http://www.legco.gov.hk/yr04-05/english/panels/tp/papers/tp1126cb1-298-6e.pdf

Hong Kong Extras, Minibus(PLB) http://www.hongkongextras.com/_minibus_public_light_bus.html

Transport Advisory Committee http://www.thb.gov.hk/tc/boards/transport/land/tac.htm

Annual report 2008 of Transport Complaints Unit

http://www.info.gov.hk/tcu/tac_report_2004_05/tcu2008.pdf

Measures to Enhance Road Safety[CB(1)298/04-05(06)]

http://www.legco.gov.hk/yr07-08/english/panels/tp/papers/tp_ppr.htm

Figure 3.8 Vehicle involvements by driver contributory factors and severity 2008

http://www.td.gov.hk/road_safety/road_traffic_accident_statistics/2008/index.htm

Administration's paper on review of public light bus operations [CB(1)2062/07-08(01)] (30 June 2008)

Measures to Enhance Safety of Public Light Buses and School Private Light Buses [CB(1)1149/06-

07(04)] (23 March 2007)

Limitation on the Number of Public Light Buses [CB(1)1412/05-06(01)] (26 May 2006)

Measures to Enhance Road Safety and Safety of Public Light Bus (PLB) Operations [CB(1)526/05-

06(01)] (19 December 2005)

Background brief prepared by the Secretariat on measures to enhance the safety of public light bus

operations[CB(1)297/04-05]

Annex 2