'Four-day Week Hurt Construction Workers' Pay'

A construction industry representative on Monday said it will be hard to introduce a four-day work week arrangement for frontline workers because most of them are subject to a daily rate, and the move would in effect reduce their income.

The Construction Industry Council (CIC) announced the “alternative four-day work week” arrangement last week, offering an additional rest day every fortnight for all of its full-time employees.

It said this shows the council’s care towards staff members’ work-life balance, adding that it hopes more companies will implement similar measures.

But the President of the Hong Kong Construction Association, Eddie Lam, said he believes most contractors won’t adopt the arrangement because it will hurt the interest of workers.

“The CIC is only for the office work. But in the front-line for operation, it’s hard to practice this for the contractors… With less working time, they [workers] will be earning less for a month,” Lam said.

The comment is echoed by the Chairman of the Construction Industry Employees General Union, Wong Ping, who said he doesn’t think this is the right time to adopt the CIC’s arrangement.