processed at the end of the year. The records then showed that there were 2,641 registered societies with 414 societies exempted from registration under the Societies Ordinance.
Thumber of arms licences on issue at the end of the years 2,033 and the number of permits of exemption was 790. A total of 455 arms and 3,214 rounds were forfeited.
There were 34 registered watchmen supplier companies, and 20,153 registered watchmen at the end of the year. This represented an increase of one registered watchmen supplier company and 3,060 registered watchmen.
A total of nine miscellaneous licensing functions were passed to other departments during the year as part of the Commissioner's policy to divest the Force of its non- constabulary duties. Another three licences were abolished.
Police licensing responsibilities continue in respect of auctioneers' licences (28), money changers' licences (443), massage establishment licences (40), marine store dealers' licences (194) and pawnbrokers' licences (146). There were a total of 1,545 miscellaneous licences and permits issued during the year.
Communications and Transport
The Communications and Transport Branch continued in its role of providing technical support to the Force, and planning telecommunication and transport facilities.
The year marked the completion of the personal beat radio scheme for the urban areas of Hong Kong. The last phase the Kowloon District system was commissioned in June, and this brought a total of more than 600 beat patrol officers in direct contact with their respective District Command and Control centres.
The software programme for the computerised informa- tion systems at control centres was also finalised by the end of the year signifying the completion of the entire project.
Coupled with the latter stages of system development was an assessment of the overall effectiveness of the scheme. Technically, radio performance in terms of coverage has exceeded theoretical expectation. Not only is coverage 100 per cent external to buildings, but signal path reliability is just as effective when operating a radio inside a building, provided the patrol officer is near an outside wall.
The multi-million dollar beat radio scheme became fully operational during the year and one interested visitor was the Chief Secretary, Sir Denys Roberts.
The success of the system as an operational tool is self- evident. About 60 per cent of all incidents are now attended by foot-patrol officers as opposed to mobile patrol crews. Before the advent of the scheme only 38 per cent of re- ported incidents were responded to by the beat officer. Moreover, the instant multi-address broadcast facilities have resulted in a number of immediate spectacular arrests in bank and jewellery shop robberies.
In retrospect, 1977 revealed a telecommunication water- shed - the beat radio scheme which in prospect had seemed to be the ultimate solution to the problem of policing densely-populated areas, now appears to be the starting point for adopting the set-on-the-man concept for all police duties, in-so-far as this is technically feasible, and where operational and economic arguments support its provision. An outline plan has been drawn up which proposes the ultimate extension of the set-on-the-man concept to all Headquarter and District formations through- out Hong Kong.
As part of this programme, the planning of schemes for the Mass Transit Railway Police and the Airport Division in Kowloon District is well advanced. Both these schemes, although fully integrated with existing networks, will have separate command and control centres because of the specialised nature of operations. In the Mass Transit Railway scheme, use will be made of slotted co-axial cable for transmission and reception between the control centre and personal radios operating in the underground sections of the line.
The work of the Telecommunications Maintenance Division continues to be given top priority. There are now more than 3,800 fixed, portable and personal radios in service, together with ship-borne radar equipment, traffic speed-measuring radar sets and many other items of electronic equipment. In order to give the Force more efficient maintenance support, central radio workshops and District command and control centres are now manned by technical staff round the clock.
The Signals Division was responsible during the year for commissioning a new computer-controlled teleprinter message-switching network to replace a similar system which had given excellent service, but was incapable of ac- commodating additional terminals. The new teleprinter sys- tem is part of the command and control equipment at District centres, and provides not only point-to-point communication between terminals, but also, print-out of information held on computer peripherals at the centres. The introduction of the system entailed a heavy operator- training programme, and altogether some 250 disciplined and civilian staff underwent familiarisation courses.
Another major and continuing project of the Division is the expansion of the Force telephone network by the enhancement of existing facilities and the addition of new exchanges. In the latter context, electronic exchanges having dial-in facilities are likely to replace the older cross-bar versions in the near future.
As a sidelight to the beat radio scheme, the training of all District Centre Controllers was undertaken by this division.
The Transport Division had another busy year. Another 97 vehicles were added to Force transport resources, and the whole of the traffic motorcycle fleet was re-equipped with machines of a more suitable type. The Force Motor Transport Officer, assisted by his District representatives,
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