An evaluation of the need for a quality assessment scheme for private sector construction projects in Hong Kong

The Construction Industry Review Report has highlighted the recent spate of non-compliant construction incidents in Hong Kong, which has prompted widespread public concern on the quality of construction projects. Whilst public housing has received special attention due to extensive coverage in the media, the quality of private housing has seldom been put under the spotlight, thereby raising the question as to whether private sector works are of better quality than public sector works.Faced with this question and the increasing drive towards benchmarking in the construction industry, it appears that an objective measure of quality is necessary, both for providing feedback to designers and for raising the quality standards of construction works. Being inspired by the benefits brought about by the CONQUAS system in Singapore, the Housing Authority in Hong Kong had developed and implemented the PASS system for benchmarking workmanship quality in the public housing sector since 1990. As yet, there has not been any similar measure of construction quality in the private sector.Therefore, a recent survey was conducted in Hong Kong to evaluate the need for a quality assessment system for the private sector. This paper draws on empirical evidence obtained from Singapore as to the benefits of a common quality assessment scheme for both the public and private sectors, in addition to depicting findings of the Hong Kong survey, which demonstrate that defects occurrence is equally likely in both sectors.