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SPD is also actively involved in the employees retraining programmes for the disabled.

In 1994, SPD registered 2,864 disabled job-seekers and placed a record figure of 1,414 in employment, with a placement rate of nearly 50 per cent.

For the first five months this year, registrations and placements with SPD stood at 1,314 and 575 respectively.

During the tour to the SPD, the Governor also watched disabled job-seekers undergo vocational assessment and chatted with them afterwards.

End/Thursday, June 15, 1995

Flags finally lowered on British Military Hospital

Nearly 100 years of military hospitals in Hong Kong come to an end this month when the British Military Hospital (BMH), at King's Park, Kowloon, closes.

Tomorrow (Friday) the flags will finally be lowered on the long and distinguished history of military hospitals in the Territory, a ceremonial occasion to be marked by the traditional Beating of Retreat performed by the visiting Band of the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (REME).

Hospital staff, dressed in period costume, will also enact the history of the medical services in Hong Kong from 1841 to the present date.

The departure of the last patient on June 23 will officially mark the closure of the hospital.

BMH was opened in 1967 and during its early years was commended for the care given to US Armed Forces during the Vietnam War and to the subsequent influx of Vietnamese boat people.

In the mid-1970s it was also decided that the hospital's spare-bed capacity should be used for the treatment of war veterans and entitled civilian and government patients.