SOCIAL WELFARE
Hong Kong has always been fortunate in the large number of local voluntary organizations which have interested themselves in practical and constructive social welfare work. Unfortunately their effectiveness has been limited in the past by lack of combined effort. Official direction and control could of course have changed this, at least on the surface, but only by dampening voluntary initiative and through the growth of a ponderous supervisory Social Welfare Office. Instead, Hong Kong's official and voluntary social welfare services continued throughout 1950 to make progress in achieving genuine coordination, particularly in the fields of community development, youth work, and emergency relief undertakings. The principal voluntary organizations which took the lead in this development were the Boys' and Girls' Clubs Association, the Children's Play- grounds Association, and over a dozen Kaifong Welfare Associations. Other outstanding events during 1950 included a wholesale revision of the law for the protection of children, new developments in connexion with juvenile delinquency, and the institution of diploma and certificate courses in social science in the University.
Kaifong Associations
Kaifong Associations are not new to Hong Kong. They have aimed in the past at representing the interests of established residents in fairly well-defined urban districts, but the standing and effectiveness of these associations varied considerably. During the last twenty years many of them were moribund. In 1949 there was
a new development in the appearance and rapid growth of Kaifong Welfare Associations which set out to gear certain of the old kaifong traditions to specific social welfare work. In 1950 these new asso- ciations grew still more numerous, and between them sponsored or opened free schools, organized free medical services, raised new St. John Ambulance divisions, provided further recreational facilities or opportunities for young people, started domestic science classes, organized local fire-prevention services, improved local street-lighting, and made lively representations to the Government on these and other matters such as local water-supplies, hawkers, market facilities and squatters. They furthermore played a most important part in organizing relief and rehabilitation work for the victims of several large fires.
By the end of the year there were three approved Kaifong Welfare Associations established in urban Kowloon and two more were being formed. The whole of Victoria was divided between nine similar associations, including one long established at Tai Hang, and there were others at Aberdeen, Aplichau, Stanley and several other smaller settlements on the south side of Hong Kong Island. The Stanley Land and Sea Citizens Association was one of the most enterprising and effective of all of them; it has had an unbroken existence for over a hundred years. All these associations, new and old, constituted a creative minority which was actively interested in furthering the practical welfare of the people of their districts. Membership is generally open to any adult, irrespective of race, who lives or has his principal place of business in the district. practice the movement has so far been entirely Chinese.
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