Social_Welfare_Annual_Report_1964-1965 — Page 48

to 1897, contains a series of provisions intended to protect women and girls from exploitation and to prevent trafficking and the running of brothels; the enforcement of these provisions is primarily the task of the Police Force. Remedial and after-care services, designed to provide firm psychological support for young women at a time when they are most in need of assistance and understanding, are the responsibility of the Department. Prostitutes who are willing to accept help are referred to social hygiene clinics when necessary or for institutional care; the chief aim is to help young girls before they have become hardened and used to easy money. The unmarried mother may be assisted with accom- modation and medical care. Counselling is given both before and after the birth of the child, to help the mother to plan wisely for her own future and the future of the child. She may be helped to legalize her union if this seems to be in the best interests of both the parents and the expected child, or to make arrangements with the putative father for maintenance or a financial settlement, or to seek care and adoption of the child by someone else.

85. Girls in moral danger still account, after dance hostesses, for the second largest number of those who seek the help of this part of the Department; services provided for them include guidance both to them- selves and to their parents and help in finding suitable jobs. Vocational training is often necessary, to attract their interest, to keep them under close observation and to provide suitable skills for future employment. Girls who have been victims of rape or sexual assault are interviewed to determine whether there have been any significant psychological or physical effects; if there have been, intensive counselling or referral for medical treatment may be required. They may also be helped, where it is necessary and possible, to change their environment, to train for em- ployment or to enter an appropriate home or friendly institution.

86. Whenever senior staff could be spared in the last few years they have helped men and women members of the Police Force to inspect dance halls, bars, dancing schools and such places at night, with the object of finding girl employees who seem to be under fifteen (the present legal minimum age for employment in such establishments), and any older women who might wish to change their way of life. But despite every effort it has to be admitted that successes are not many. This is a field where prevention is possible at an early age in the shape of proper education and upbringing, but cure is not so common.

87. The staff of the two Vocational Training Centres at Tung Tau and Chai Wan try to restore women and girls to self-respect and economic

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