welfare services in great variety. In addition to these, there are many purely Chinese organizations, of which the Kai Fong Associations and the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals are perhaps the best known examples, which are dedicated to meeting social needs in various fields, notably in the educational and medical fields with which this report is not directly concerned. To prevent duplication, to co-ordinate services, to plan ahead, or to interpret to the public the need or extent of such services, various co-ordinating bodies exist. Caritas performs this function for the Catholic agencies; the Hong Kong Christian Welfare and Relief Council is active for the majority of the Protestant group; the Hong Kong Conference of Youth Organizations exists to co-ordinate and promote work within its own field.
92. But most prominent and comprehensive in its scope is the Hong Kong Council of Social Service which has the major co-ordinating role, with about seventy affiliated organizations and a growing permanent staff under a qualified and experienced Canadian Executive Director, appointed in September. One of the major functions of the Council of Social Service in the past has been its information and publicity work, which brings dividends from far beyond the limits of Hong Kong. This is accomplished by such means as a regular news-letter, a booklet listing the affiliated voluntary organizations, an interpretative leaflet and a Chinese periodical publication; the Council also offers facilities to visitors and local residents who wish to know more about welfare services.
93. Council committees and projects during the past year included the Central Relief Records Office (which helps agencies to avoid overlapping of their efforts in individual cases), an Employment Assistance Scheme and the Resettlement Estates Loans Association. This Association was hived off from the Council in January and is thus the last of several agencies nurtured in their formative years under the Council's wing. Some of these, such as the Hong Kong Family Welfare Society, are now in their own right among the most important bodies in the welfare field. The Council has also acted as a medium through which financial con- tributions from various parts of the world may be transmitted to designated agencies or services. The Director took the chair at an important seminar on drug addiction in October attended by many government officials, social workers and interested individuals (see also paragraph 61). The Council held several important meetings to bring together, in proper and convincing relationship, the views of the voluntary agencies on the Government policy paper. It has clearly entered a new and vigorous era in its history, in which much initiative and effort is already being devoted
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