45
Compassionate rehousing
Following is a question by the Hon Fred Li Wah-ming and a written reply by the Secretary for Health and Welfare, Mrs Katherine Fok, in the Legislative Council today (Wednesday):
Question:
According to the existing policy on compassionate rehousing, the Housing Department (HD) reserves, as from 1994-95, a quota of 2,000 public housing flats each year to be used by the Social Welfare Department (SWD) for compassionate rehousing purpose. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council of the following:
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
of the respective numbers of flats in the compassionate rehousing quota used by the SWD in 1994-95 and 1995/96 (from 1st April up to the present);
of the breakdown of the number of cases approved in 1994/95 and 1995/96 according to the applicants' living conditions (such as living environment, income, family background and so on) and their health conditions (to be supported by medical certificates) which are the two main eligibility criteria for compassionate rehousing adopted by the SWD;
whether there is a set of standardised guidelines commonly used by SWD staff in examining applicants' eligibility; if so, what the contents of the guidelines are; if not, what criteria the SWD staff adopt in the screening process;
whether the HD will, upon receiving compassionate rehousing cases referred by the SWD, re-examine such referrals, or simply the SWD in allocating public housing flats to the applicants; and whether the location of flats offered for rehousing is decided by the SWD or HD; and
whether there are clear internal guidelines within the HD and the SWD which delineating the responsibilities of the two departments in implementing the policy on compassionate rehousing?