Update | Hong Kong police set to clear Occupy protesters 'this week'

Police will take action "this week" to clear protesters from some occupied sites just as a new poll showed that nearly 70 per cent of the public wants the movement to end.

For the first time since it started the poll in September, Chinese University found more people opposed the Occupy movement than supported it. Of the 1,030 respondents, 43 per cent were against and 34 per cent for the movement - indicating a shift in public sentiment.

Even those who supported the democracy protests believed it was time to bring it to an end. About 67 per cent of all respondents said protesters should go home.

This came as a police source told the South China Morning Post that the force would take action "within this week" to help bailiffs implement court injunction orders against protesters occupying sites in Admiralty and Mong Kok.

But he said police would not carry out the action at "odd hours".

"The working hours of bailiffs are from 9am to 5pm on weekdays, so that's when it will happen," the source said. "Perhaps only an hour or two earlier [than 9am] at most, definitely not during the small hours.