Ombudsman wants clear delineation of responsibilities in handling tree complaints among govt departments

Hong Kong’s government watchdog said on Thursday there should be a clear delineation of responsibilities among government departments in the handling of complaints involving trees on government land, in order to avoid the impression of departments passing the buck.

The Ombudsman’s direct investigation has scrutinized the work of the city’s Tree Management Office in coordinating and supervising departments’ handling of tree complaints.  It further scrutinized the delineation of tree management responsibilities among departments, and studied information provided by ten major tree management departments.

The watchdog said information provided by 1823 showed that between 2018 and October 2022, an average of some 24,000 tree complaints were received each year. About 1,100 of those cases on average involved disputes over responsibilities among departments.

“Each year, in dozens of such cases, the complainant received a reply only after more than three months,” it said.

The Ombudsman said while the number of cases involving disputes over responsibilities makes up only a small percentage of the annual total, the conditions of trees change from one minute to the next.

“If tree complaints are not handled in a timely manner due to departments’ disagreements over responsibilities, not only would it easily lead to an impression of departments passing the buck, but also pose safety hazards.” It added.

In light of the findings, the Ombudsman has made a total of eight recommendations, focusing on the Tree Management Office. It suggested that the office should consider using the overall handling time of the case as a criterion for intervention.

It also said the office should supervise departments’ strict compliance with the requirements of the inter-departmental mechanism in handling complaint referrals and instruct departments to conduct joint inspections promptly in case of disputes over tree maintenance responsibilities.

Meanwhile, the Ombudsman’s investigation revealed that none of the government departments have drawn up an internal time frame for carrying out ordinary tree work or set up a database recording the completion dates of tree work in response to complaints.

According to the 1823, the Lands Department used to have a huge number of tree complaints with overdue replies. As of both December 2021 and March 2022, the department had a backlog of more than 2,000 tree complaints where replies remained outstanding. 

Information also showed that referrals from 1823 involving risks of tree collapse, took the department more than a year to reply to the complainant via 1823 only to say that the case was still under investigation.

The Ombudsman said it finds such serious delays absolutely unacceptable. It suggested the departments make good use of the computer information system it is developing as an internal monitoring tool to facilitate case follow-up and data analysis.