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SOCIAL WELFARE
unwanted children in Hong Kong have been adopted legally by families abroad through the good offices of two international organizations, International Social Service and Catholic Relief Services; some 228 children joined a family overseas last year.
Group Work with Young People. Living conditions severely restrict the development of children, both physically and otherwise. About one-fifth of the city dwellers still live in squatter shacks on hillsides or roof-tops and a much larger proportion live in unbelievably congested slum tenements; even when a squatter family is resettled there is little scope for recreation. Playgrounds are inevitably scarce and few schools have time or space for organized games.
A great effort has been made in this situation to develop clubs, especially on the roof-tops of resettlement blocks, which are ideal for the purpose. There are now 200 clubs with a membership of over twelve thousand boys and girls, nearly all aged eight to fourteen; about half of them are members of the Boys' and Girls' Clubs Association and the rest of affiliated bodies, including the Youth Welfare Section of the Department which has over 400 children in 15 clubs. The children receive some informal education and do handwork, play games and compete in groups; take part in country picnics, visits to exhibitions and ships in port, sports meetings and so on; the object is their fuller development in an atmosphere both more free and more ordered than their homes can usually offer. At two country holiday camps by the sea about 5,000 poor children, some seeing the country for the first time, were able to enjoy a week or ten days in the open air with plenty of good food and exercise; funds to establish a third camp have been given by the United Kingdom World Refugee Year Committee.
The YMCA and the YWCA each provide recreation centres where several thousand young people can follow their bent in handicrafts, hobbies and vocational training in great variety. The Boy Scouts and Girl Guides Associations, with a total of nearly ten thousand members between them, also make a valuable con- tribution in this field.
Children's libraries are extremely popular, especially with the many who can neither afford books nor get into school; two of the oldest established are used regularly by over 600 children.