TNAG-0608-FCO40-756-Planning-paper-on-progress-made-on-social-security-in-Hong-K-1977 — Page 60

XCC(77)73

CONFIDENTIAL # 2

Copy No ..33. of 80

Page 2 of 3

Officer grade in the Social Welfare Department existing on 1st September 1977. However, the Director of Social Welfare is taking the following measures to provide more, and to make better use of, trained manpower:

(a)

(b)

(c)

reviewing the social welfare class to improve career prospects;

discussing with the Universities and the Polytechnic the introduction of part-time professional and vocational courses to enable non social work graduates and welfare assistants to obtain social work qualifica - tions; and

converting various posts to be filled by non social work trained staff e. g. in social security, school social work, etc.

Another constraint which the Director is examining is the ability of voluntary agencies to attract and retain suitable social workers for the more demanding tasks such as outreach work among youth.

C

Financial implications

6

The demands on Government revenue to meet the recurrent and capital costs of the four programmes during the next five years are set out in Annex C. Recurrent costs in the first year (1978/79) will be of the order of $504 million, or an increase of $98 million over estimated expenditure on existing services in the current financial year, rising to $719 million in 1982/83. Total additional recurrent expenditure during the next five years over 1977/78 levels will be of the order of $1,079 million. Over the next three years the total additional expenditure is approximately $500 million and in his forecast of public expenditure announced earlier this year covering this period, the Financial Secretary included provision for the rehabilitation programme and for a number of services covered in the programme for the elderly, or about 30% of the total. The forecast did not include provision for the social security or youth programmes or for the full range of services for the elderly as these had not materialised at the time the forecast was made. Capital costs will amount to, on average, approximately $36 million in each of the next five years. It is expected that a substantial proportion of these services will be carried out by voluntary agencies, with assistance from the Lotteries Fund.

7

These costs do not include the administrative costs of es - tablishing a sickness injury and death benefit scheme, nor the possible computerisation of social security records. Nor do they include the possible shortening of the eligibility period from 18 to 12 months for

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