Social_Welfare_Annual_Report_1964-1965 — Page 30

voluntary agencies and for observing the present work in this field. His report was being studied by the Government at the end of the year. But even before Mr JONES' visit a nucleus of basic rehabilitation services for handicapped persons had already been established and there was a welcome movement forward towards closer integration of all these services. As a practical illustration of this trend there is the Rehabilitation Centre at Aberdeen, with expanded and improved departmental facilities for training. Aberdeen, the largest of the Department's institutions, has a maximum capacity of six hundred and was opened by the Governor on 4 June 1964. His Excellency Sir David TRENCH's speech on this notable occasion is reprinted at Appendix 9, because among other features it included an important call to the public, and particularly to employers, to give positive help in restoring the disabled to employment and to a useful place in the community. Aberdeen's considerable vocational training facilities, in bright, modern surroundings, work in co-operation with the surgical appliance centre of the Medical and Health Depart- ment, and include instruction in practical modern trades like printing and light mechanics. The first year's statistics for the centre are in Appen- dix 10. The aim is a single continuous process of rehabilitation, from initial medical treatment through vocational training to final resettlement in employment and self-reliance. As an interesting addition to Hong Kong's resources for this work, the World Rehabilitation Fund Inc has undertaken to provide funds for a day-centre for the disabled with main emphasis on vocational rehabilitation, and at the same time has promised funds for a residential home and school for spastic children. The responsibility for planning the day centre is entrusted to the Depart-

ment.

BLIND WELFARE

53. One of the most enterprising projects for the handicapped in Hong Kong, a voluntary effort with strong financial support from public funds, is the workshop run by the Hong Kong Society for the Blind; this is equipped with modern machinery and provides employment for the present in machine sewing, broom, brush and button making, crate and box construction and mending, and chalk making. It employs a hundred and seventy workers, including a few with some other handicap than blindness. Apart from those at this workshop, the Department helped forty-four others to find employment. Three departmental clubs for the blind assist them to adjust initially to their handicap. A centre for the Blind is being built with Rotary Club Funds at Shau Kei Wan, to be devoted to the rehabilitation of the older blind. Its foundation

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