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joy to thousands of youngsters. The mobile stage costing nearly $200,000.00 was delivered to Hong Kong and has been extensively used in outdoor entertainment programmes. The stage can be readily set up in any playground within a relatively short period. It can not only save a lot of labour cost, but it also offers a better arrangement for stage performances. The Council spent nearly 1.4 million dollars in entertainment for 1 million people in its outdoor entertainment programmes.
We fully realize the entertainment value of recreation activities both to the participants and spectators. Initiative was taken to introduce organized recreation activities at grass root level which had been grossly neglected. District competitions were organized for practically all major sports. We are now in the course of making an in-depth study of all sports in order to ascertain the area where we can offer the best assistance. We wish to stimulate interest, to serve as a catalyst in overlooked areas and to supplement existing activities. The Learn-to-Swim scheme continued to be a very popular programme and the duration had to be extended in order to cope with the demand. Because it was free, there were many people who enrolled to join the scheme but eventually failed to turn up at the classes. The scheme should again be organized in future but consideration for a nominal entrance fee should be considered in order to allow better control of the participants. The subsidy of the Council on recreation activities amounted to nearly $300,000.00 in 1975 and is likely to be further increased in future, as we all realize the importance of the healthy aspect of such programmes.
As we intensified the recreation activities, specially since the introduction of the Recreation and Sport Scheme in 1974, we realize that the bottleneck in organizing activities is the shortage of facilities. One logical answer to this question is to maximize the usage of existing facilities. Swimming pool complexes are closed for several months during the winter and no use is made of the facilities. This closure allows maintenance to be undertaken but this should not take longer than one month. This winter we are carrying out an experimental scheme for the use of swimming pools in winter for recreation and entertainment purposes. Whilst the Government has been slow in the construction of indoor stadiums, we have not been idle in the provision of indoor game halls. Besides the East Kai Tak Games Hall which was completed in 1973, new games halls at Boundary Street and Cheung Sha Wan Road are under construction and will be completed in the near future. Games Halls at Ho Man Tin, Aberdeen, and Wan Chai are already on the drawing board whilst games halls in other districts will follow shortly and there will be one public games hall per district in a few years' time. The standard size of games halls has been 32 x 19 meters which will basically allow only one activity to be organized at any time. Based on the large number of bookings turned down in the use of games halls, we have to seriously consider building bigger games halls in future. If space is available, we should consider a two-court 36 × 32 meters hall. Where space is limited, consideration should be given to a smaller 32 × 26 meters hall which would also allow considerable flexibility in the usage of the hall. By permitting activities in two directions, flexibility of arrangements will be increased and it would not significantly increase the size of the area of the hall which has great bearing on the construction cost.
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Whilst we are concerned about the shortage of facilities, yet there are playgrounds not fully utilized and many parents are hesitant to allow their children to play in some playgrounds because of fear of possible presence of bad elements in the playgrounds. During the question and answer session in the August 1975 meeting, I mentioned that there was no clear evidence that any Council playgrounds were fully controlled by triads or youth gangs. Where such attempts have been made, the ground staff have been able to take action with police assistance, as necessary. The fact that gangs or triads do not appear to control playgrounds does not preclude the possibility of other malpractices. Action taken in the improvement of the situation has so far included improvement of management by ground staff with police assistance as necessary and the introduction of a play leadership scheme operated by various voluntary agencies with the full support of the Council. Now is the time for us to encourage the establishment of neighbourhood recreation clubs so that the local community can be encouraged to offer their advice and assistance in the management of their neighbourhood playground. The playground can be better equipped and managed with the assistance of such recreation clubs, which could further take up the responsibility for establishing policies and overseeing the actual administration and operation of the recreation programmes in the playground. Its functions should include helping to discover and use resources for community recreation, relating the needs, services, and development in recreation to other services and organizations in the community, helping to find and develop recreation leadership, reflecting community interests, attitudes, and opinions, besides helping to secure better facilities and financial support for recreation and sponsoring recreation projects. If such neighbourhood clubs could be actively promoted, we can be sure of safer, better-managed, and fully utilized playgrounds.
We are now living in a changing world and we have to review regularly the changing background and social problems in order to...
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