Justice David Lok cautions against turning the panel into a Commission of Inquiry with statutory powers at this stage
Leopold ChenandBrian WongPublished: 10:28am, 15 Apr 2026Updated: 10:35am, 15 Apr 20260 New UpdateIntroductionThis story has been made freely available as a public service to our readers. Please consider supporting SCMP’s journalism by subscribing.A judge-led panel investigating the causes of Hong Kong’s deadliest fire in decades, which killed 168 people in Tai Po, will begin its 12th day of evidential hearings on Wednesday.
Representatives from the Fire Services Department and police are expected to testify before the independent committee tasked with investigating the causes of the Wang Fuk Court blaze and systemic issues in the city’s building maintenance sector.
In the previous session, the committee heard from frontline firefighters who described the inferno as “unprecedented” and said it spread much faster than usual.
They also said the Fire Services Department had no established guidelines for handling deactivated fire alarms, one of six “human factors” identified by the committee’s lead counsel, Victor Dawes, as contributing to the catastrophic toll.
Earlier sessions revealed that the department had never conducted fire risk assessments at the housing estate, which was under renovation.
Fire services installation contractor China Status Development and Engineering also admitted to the committee that it had acted as a “rubber stamp” by filing shutdown notices to the department on behalf of renovation contractor Prestige Construction and Engineering in order to allow renovation of the fire service tanks. Its staff had never inspected the site, let alone assessed the necessity of the system shutdown.
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