HONG KONG LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL - 20 January 1988
643
DR. IP: Sir, assuming that the site can be vacated on 1 September 1988 as mentioned, when will the Argyle Street Ophthalmic Centre project be completed and ready for medical service?
SECRETARY FOR SECURITY: Sir, I do not have any information on that side of the story but what I can say is that the project is at present in category A/B and that the timing for the removal of the Argyle Street Reception Centre is consistent with the timing for getting it into category A.
HIS EXCELLENCY THE PRESIDENT: Secretary for Health and Welfare, do to add to that?
you
wish
SECRETARY FOR HEALTH AND WELFARE: Sir, my understanding is that following the timing indicated by the Secretary for Security, the target completion date of the Ophthalmic Centre will be June 1991 which is about six months later than originally scheduled, though every effort will be made to try and speed this up, but that is the best date we can give at the moment.
Expatriate English teachers' pilot scheme
4. DR. Ho asked: Will Government inform this Council of the progress of the expatriate English language teachers' pilot scheme which was established in September 1987, in particular the problems being encountered and how these problems are being resolved?
SECRETARY FOR EDUCATION AND MANPOWER: Sir, the pilot scheme referred to by Dr. Ho is for the two-year period from August 1987 to August 1989 and is being run by the British Council.
A total of 81 posts were originally chosen to take part in this scheme and in the first recruitment exercise, which was completed in the middle of 1987, 59 appropriately qualified teachers were engaged. They had a briefing in London and a two-week induction course in Hong Kong before starting to teach in our schools in September 1987.
Since then another 23 teachers have been recruited and they are now going through an induction course and will start teaching in February.
One of the original 59 teachers has resigned, as I understand for personal reasons, so by February we expect 81 teachers to be working in 41 participating schools.
The pilot scheme is to be evaluated by procedures designed by the British Council in conjunction with the Education Department and the Hong Kong Examinations Authority. These testing procedures are among the most rigorous used in any language teaching scheme anywhere. They are being used, first to