FINANCE
38. Expenditure on the Fire Service was $11.4 million, and on the Ambulance Service $1.3 million. Based on a population of 3.3 million the estimated cost per capita to provide Fire and Ambulance Services was $3.85. Income for the year from the Fire Prevention Bureau and Ambulance Service was $176,000.
BUILDINGS AND ACCOMMODATION
39. Progress was limited to the completion of the first block of quarters for rank and file at North Point. Design work has proceeded on Principal Fire Station/Kowloon District Headquarters Canton Road; Training School/District Headquarters New Territories, rank and file quarters in Kowloon and a standard plan for Ambulance Depots.
40. The first block in a programme of rank and file quarters was opened at North Point in November 1962 by Mr. A. M. J. WRIGHT, then Deputy Director of Public Works, and made a timely and sub- stantial contribution to an improvement in morale.
41. These rank and file quarters are invaluable not only for operational reasons but also because the provision of quarters for officers in a service subject to discipline, long hours of stand-by and frequently danger has undoubted value in maintaining morale and in attracting recruits to what, in some respects, may appear to be an arduous and comparatively unattractive service. The men also find that another advantage is the comparatively low rents when compared with those that they have to pay for private accommodation.
42. Pending completion of the major projects referred to in para- graph 39, the Service continues to rely on the use of temporary premises which at the end of the year were as follows:
Fire Services Headquarters
District Headquarters, Kowloon
District Headquarters, Hong Kong
7
Howe Block,
Ex H.M.S. Tamar, Queen's Road East, Hong Kong.
Ex Naval Camber, Canton Road, Kowloon.
Ex Naval Quarters, Harcourt Road, Hong Kong.