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SOCIAL WELFARE
The Social Welfare Department provides the handicapped with direct services including counselling, compassionate rehousing, financial assistance, technical aids and day and residential care. It directly operates facilities including an integrated child care centre, a composite club for the handicapped, residential homes and hostels, work activity centres and sheltered workshops. The services provided by the 28 subvented agencies active in this field include (in addition to those provided by the department) pre-school care, education and training programmes, special child care centres, home help services, halfway houses for ex-mental patients, special transport schemes, sports, social and recreational programmes, sign language interpretation services and mobility and orientation training for the blind.
By the end of the year, the Social Welfare Department and welfare agencies provided a total of 725 work activity places (with 360 more places in new centres planned for 1986) and 2 520 in sheltered workshops (420 places to become available in 1986). These facilities provide employment for disabled adults unable to compete in the open job market.
Owing to financial constraints, the improved staffing standards recommended in the Sheltered Workshop Working Party's report could not be fully implemented in 1985. However, staffing provision in sheltered workshops in the subvented sector was brought up to a level comparable to the provisions for departmental workshops.
The severely disabled who cannot be cared for adequately at home, or those who have no close relatives to look after them, are entitled to residential care. There are 625 places in homes for mentally handicapped adults with plans in hand to provide an additional 358 places in 1986. Homes for physically disabled adults have 219 places. There are 243 existing residential places for the blind, and 160 more places will be provided in 1986.
At the end of the year, subvented welfare agencies provided 484 places for mildly handicapped pre-school age children in integrated child care centres, 11 special child care centres with 480 places (including 54 residential places) for severely handicapped pre-school age children, 250 halfway houses for ex-mental patients, a fleet of 21 Rehabuses, two sports associations and 18 social clubs for the handicapped.
Further efforts were made to improve after-care and rehabilitation services for discharged mental patients. By the end of 1985, 250 places were provided in halfway houses, and an improved staffing standard for these facilities was implemented during the year in respect of two halfway houses. The Committee on Public Education in Rehabilitation persisted in its attempts to foster a more positive public attitude towards former mental patients.
The Social Welfare Department, in conjunction with the welfare agencies concerned, completed a review of the policy on social, recreational and sports services for the disabled. The recommendations in the resulting report will be considered by the government departments concerned and the welfare sector.
Training
The training of professional social workers is the responsibility of the two universities, the polytechnics and post-secondary colleges. The Social Welfare Department and welfare agencies assist in the provision of field work placements for social work students from these institutions. The Social Welfare Department, through its Training Section at the Lady Trench Training Centre, provides in-service training programmes, refresher courses and staff development programmes for both departmental staff and staff of welfare agencies. During the year, the number of courses, programmes, seminars and workshops organised by the Training Section totalled 137, compared with 116 in 1984. The Training Section also operates a child care centre which, besides providing day care for 100 children aged between two and five serves as a training facility for trainees in child care work.