A26
1976 Green Paper : The Further Development of Rehabilitation Services in Hong Kong
16.
In July 1976, a Programme Plan for Rehabilitation Services
was prepared by a government interdepartmental working group. The
plan covered a ten-year period from 1975 and was prepared in consultation
with government departments providing rehabilitation services and with
the Joint Council for the Physically and Mentally Disabled of the
Hong Kong Council of Social Service. The services recommended in
the plan were intended to cater for the needs of the deaf (and partially-
hearing), the blind (and partially-sighted), the mentally ill, the
mentally retarded, slow learning and maladjusted children, the physically
disabled and those with multiple disabilities. A summary of the main
findings and recommendations contained in the plan was tabled in the
Legislative Council on 13th October 1976 as a Green Paper entitled
'The Further Development of Rehabilitation Services in Hong Kong'.
Those recommendations of the Green Paper affecting special education
services are summarised here.
17.
The 1976 Green Paper recommended
(i) the existing audiometric screening programme to
be extended to cover all Primary 1 students by
1st April 1981;
(ii) a vision screening programme to be introduced to
cover all Primary 1 pupils by 1st April 1978;
(iii) the group testing programme (to identify children
with learning problems so that remedial services
could be provided at an early stage during a child's
education), then provided only in some Primary 1
classes, to be provided to all Primary 1 classes
by 1st April 1978;
(iv) the speech screening programme to be extended to
cover all Primary 3 pupils, including those in
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