China has set up an inspection tour system to check the performance of government officials and state-owned enterprises' managers, an official with the Communist Party of China's discipline sector said yesterday at a news conference in Beijing.

Gan Yisheng, secretary-general and spokesman with the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection of the CPC, said the commission has so far completed inspection tours of 31 provincial governments, four state assets management corporations and nine state-controlled banks.

The provincial governments have also respectively established their inspection tour system to check local governments and state-owned enterprises.

More than 10,000 government officials were held liable by 11 provincial-level and 18 major city governments in the first half of this year in a national campaign against slack administrative law enforcement.

Gan said the commission is making great efforts to promote the transparency of the government's administrative power as an effective way of eradicating corruption.

Gan described three steps to reach the goal:

to clear up the government's administrative power: all administrative power should be legal and those powers prescribed by official documents will be annulled if they conflict with law.

to make known to the public the scope of the government's administrative power.

to make known the government's workflow and receive public supervision.

So far, 85 per cent of the county-level governments and 83 per cent of the prefecture-level governments have established the system of transparent government.

To implement the concept of scientific development, the commission has made environmental protection one of its top concerns this year.

Gan said it would be a dereliction of duty if local officials develop the economy at the cost of the environment.

This year, the commission has carried out more than 20 inspection projects nationwide, working with relevant sectors to rectify unhealthy tendencies such as blind investment, repeated construction and "image projects," which are a sheer waste of both labour and money.

The Ministry of Supervision and the State Environmental Protection jointly promulgated the Interim Regulations on the Punishment of Violations of Environmental Protection Laws or Disciplines on February 20.

The commission has paid special attention to cases violating people's interests, including producing and selling inferior food and medicine, failing to provide safe working conditions and delaying migrant workers' wages.

By the end of June, various parts of the country had paid 177 billion yuan (US$21.9 billion) in delayed construction workers' wages.

(China Daily July 28, 2006)