PUBLIC ORDER
self-defence, emergency response tactics, adventure training, field training, Putonghua, Chinese writing skills and personal computer training.
Training programmes are reviewed regularly to meet changing society and operational needs. Apart from uniformed staff, orientation/recruit training courses are also arranged for newly appointed non-custodial staff, such as clinical psychologists and technical instructors.
Selected staff are also sent on courses run by relevant government departments and local universities, or to participate in overseas visits and training in order to broaden their horizons and to keep them abreast of the latest trend and development in correctional services world wide.
Non-government Organisations
Several organisations help the CSD provide services to help inmates reintegrate into the community. These include the Society for the Rehabilitation of Offenders, Hong Kong; Caritas Lok Heep Club; Hong Kong Christian Kun Sun Association; Wu Oi Christian Centre and the Prisoners' Friends' Association. They provide services such as case work, counselling, hostel accommodation, employment assistance, recreational activities and care for those with a history of mental illness.
Civil Aid Service (CAS)
The Civil Aid Service is a government auxiliary emergency service with an establishment of 3 634 adult members, 3 232 cadets and a permanent staff of 120 civil servants.
Roles and Responsibilities
Its main role is to support government departments in tackling emergency situations. Volunteers are trained to perform duties during typhoons, landslips and flooding; to search for and rescue people lost, injured or trapped in mountains, collapsed buildings or buried in landslides; to combat forest fires and oil pollution at sea; to carry out crowd control duties and provide communication services at charity functions and government events.
Service Training
The CAS provides full-time and part-time training to its members to equip and prepare them for their operational tasks. The training covers counter-disaster skills, fire-fighting, anti-oil pollution, flood rescue, radiological protection, cardio- pulmonary resuscitation and conventional rescue instruction. In 1997, 178 full-time courses and 88 part-time courses were conducted. During the year, the CAS continued to send its permanent staff and members overseas for mountain rescue and disaster management training.
Vietnamese Migrant Duties
The CAS has been involved in refugee management since 1975. During 1997, it continued to manage the New Horizons Vietnamese Refugee Departure Centre (for Vietnamese refugees accepted for resettlement overseas). The CAS deployed 40 members and eight permanent staff to manage the centre on a daily basis.
293
i.