Part of the urgent hospital-transfer operation may soon be handled by the Auxiliary Medical Service under a new Fires Services Department proposal.

Director of Fire Services Kwok Jing-keung said today the move will allow ambulance personnel to concentrate more on emergencies. Discussions with the Security Bureau, Hospital Authority and Auxiliary Medical Services are underway.

Meanwhile, a customer satisfaction survey on ambulance services will be commissioned this year to gain a better understanding of public needs. On the proposed priority dispatch system, Mr Kwok said a steering committee has been formed to scrutinise the results of the consultancy recommendations. A public survey will be launched once the committee has come up with concrete proposals.

The director said the department has applied for open recruitment of over 300 posts in 2006-07. A funding application will be submitted to the Legislative Council's Finance Committee for the provision of a diving training centre within this financial year. Construction is aimed to start by the end of this year.

There were 37,741 fire calls last year, up 7.5% over 2004. About 89.17% of building fires were handled within six minutes. However, there were 3,481 cases in which fire appliances could not reach the scene within the target response time. The main reasons included the rise in fire calls, the operational problems of the Third Generation Mobilising System in the initial stage, long travel distance, and inclement weather. There were 584,882 ambulance calls and about 89.6% of them were handled within 12 minutes.