THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, APRIL 6, 1957...
HONGKONG
"B
EFORE THE COMMUNISTS camo to power in China, Hongkong had one very effective way of dealing with the beggar problem, They were pushed over the border-and banishment was a real punishment,
"But now," said the Wellare Officer, "the Chinose authorities just push them back again."
Clearly then this is no answer to the problem today.
o's the
"It's a social problem, you see?“ The speaker was 仃 senior Polico officer in Kowloon, who has about 800 known professional beggars "toped." The Kowloon monthly average to appear in
same The
facas Court
is about 100. reappear roughly twice a year.
"We could round 'om all up in a couple of days if we wanted to but what should wo do with them.
You'll have the Kowtoon
but cleared of boggars moment you let them go they'll be back again.
hey'il tall the probation officer they are not going to any institution, that they don't want to leave the community—— that's the crux of the problem.
"If the chap is prepared to accept welfare, subject to the probation officer's report to the Magistrate it will be maca arationic to him. but very tow take ad- vantage of this. Some take a meal and, a blanket and go back to begging again
"I don't think the Police by them- solves will ever get rid of the beggars. 1ney can't-they are only one part in the general scheme. It involves very much
more than the Police."
The law makers, for instance--and the Bench and the public. The Social Walture Officer takes up the story at this point:
We decided that unless the law is changed to make really tougn penuruva For in able-bodied young men instead of giving them money from the poor box, the Poirco are just wasting their time picking them up.
"They have been very mumerous and no
to read..
public institutions cared for them and no schools
xisted where they could be taught Indeed, it was not until Christian missionaries" devised a system for them that they could read สเ
best they could only eke out a pre-
existence as public entertainers, story
ellen, or musicians. Many beggars have be- come such because of the famines eo prevalent In China, Smetimes mendicancy has been only temporary.
In other Instances, it has brroine vermement and profes- sional.
The
י.
conditions existing In present-day Hongkong are hardly comparable with Inter-day Chinii, but in an ensis
there 01 plenty among the inevitably poor roughly 700,000 the from refugees maininnd. Many have found work, some at the expense of the local popula
01).
Crities will Argue that the Colony's industrial boom which now provides 26-30 per cent of our ex- purts must have absorbed some of the unemployed. Couple this with the vast developmental
scheinet, basic rond and PWD work that musi grow with Colony that has been ut the pending in recent years rate of mor than 70,000 a year without any help from immigrants.
Sen
But these same years that LAVA
boom The Colony's industries under the Impetus of refugee and Bewish rapital, and know-how trum the north, have also seen Hongkong a severe trade depression. plagued by a who pog
The embargo on the export of strategic KOO hus. It is argued, stopped Britain and the West frum supplying
stime of China's gigantic needs Ind zorced reconstruction China Irrevocably into the hands of Soviet Russiu,
"If you stop them into gaot and give thom some nord work to oo, they may TOINK twice about it.
Many of thuso people have familios. And many able-bodied mon con carn mare, quite a lot more, by begging tron by working.
it a man has been earning $3 or $4 a day for several years it is a hard task to change his way of life.
"But it is fittle use making penalties harsher unless you change the attitude of mugistrates-and not only the magis- traces. You must change the public's attitude as well!
*inaredo or giving to individual hard- luck cases it would be very much outter to give money to voluntary agencies by whom it would be well spent.
"We must do things in a different way from the ways or communist, it the public were more up to date on welfare matters, it would help us--and beggars would not do so well."
Hongkong » nus the only city in the world with a beggar problem. In India, the Middle cost and most countries with In a poor standard of living they exist thousands.
Here is what Kenneth Scott Latourette, historian and author of "The Chmeso: their History and Culture" has to say of beggars:
"They have been a fairly numorous and well-recognised portion of the com- munity. As a rule their plight has been miserable. People have been driven into mendiconcy by a variety of causos. in the case of many, iliness or an accident has incapacitated the sufforors for ordinary employment and, in default of friends or family who could give financial support, the beggar's life has offered the The blind only escape from starvation. have been peculiarly unfortunate.
*
In more recent years, trade has been increasing and prosperity growing with 15, but the lyrics which
yh the rich get rich and the pour get children were never more true inan they are in Hongkong moday,
1 problem furthermore that appears to be growing at the <xtremes — and, at this rate, can never be deprived of those condi- tions which are partly if not wholly responsible for t
The prospect are, if this trend continues, that the problem will get
worse.
have deliberately omitted discussing the touts, the spivs, the flower giris, the imps in Causeway Buy who fasten themselves to the
gs of American sallors and only uncoil for coins, the feather duster experts, and those who open taxi doors.
They would multiply the beggar population enormously, but they are not, strictly speaking, in the same category although they are in many enses part of the same problem. On the whole the publie appears to be less sympathetic to them,
theni.
But the beggars Hongkong doesn't seem to be able to make up its mind what it wants to do about I don't mean the Police or the Social Welfare Offler, but somebody has to make a decision to do somie- thing sometime or take the responsibility for not doing anything,
There need be no illusions about this business. To rid the city and the country districts of the New China tries to suggest that but I doubt Territories of beggars does not mean that poverty has been banished. svhether anyone believes it.
Or perhaps Hongkong's beggars do serve a purpose by advertising the greater unseen squalor that Hes behind the facade of wealth in the main city streets.
Perhaps, in view of our need of international ald for refugees they remind our visitors that there is poverty as well as beauty under the night lights of Hongkong... and that it is someone else's responsibility as well as ours to find a solution to the Colony's unprecedented problems.
So the beggars may be a useful nuisance-bus taken out of the context of the general poverty there are 1,500 men and women who still make up an unsolved problem.
MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN
THE STRANGE WORLD BEYOND
| THE 'LITTLE FOG'--
SOME OF THOSE
SPHERES LOOK HUSE
--LIKE SKYSCRAPERS. IS THAT A CITY?
PROVE THERE
JOHNNY HAZARD
by Robin Hutcheon
"IT LOOKED LIKE A CLUSTER OF GIANT BUBBLES SHINING IN THE SUN--/ SAW NO PEOPLE
| AS THE FRONT DE THE PLANE IS SEALED OFF |FROM THE NUCLEAR REACTOR CHAMBER, THE | OUTSIDE WALL CLOSES,MASKING THE BASE
FROM THE WORLD I ment.
THIS IS FANTASTIC ENOUGH TO BE UNREAL, KITTY、、 BUT IT'S HAPPENING!
*) SHOUTED, AND
IM DARNED IF THE WHOLE BLASTED THING DIDN'T GO UP INTO THE ARI"
HEY THERE--
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