ENG-1966 — Page 42

REVIEW

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financial support given through the United Nations Children's Emergency Fund for the establishment of a training unit in the Social Welfare Department, and also by the creation of a Social Work Training Fund from World Refugee Year donations, which has enabled university teaching of social work to be supported and developed.

With the development of social work training came the beginnings of a new outlook which, without in any way seeking to deny assist- ance to the individual when it was needed, began to show relief assistance as a poor substitute for rehibilitation. Substantial feeding programmes are still maintained by a number of large voluntary agencies, just as relief rations are still issued by the Social Welfare Department. But nowadays those who work in the social welfare field-admittedly helped by the growth in the economy and the better facilities available-look at the total family problem, asking why the family is destitute and aiming to put it on its feet again as soon as possible. The same attitude applies to other people with whom social workers come into contact. Put very simply, we still give, but we also seek, where possible, a return or an entry into the mainstream of life whereby the individual and his family-can contribute to the good of the community and regain self-respect and a living.

A very welcome feature of the period has been the increasing sense of community among voluntary agencies, the realization that partnership and not competition will best serve those in need, the growing appreciation of the benefits of co-ordination and co-opera- tion, and the emergence in a position of increased respect and stand- ing of the Hong Kong Council of Social Service. This Council has been reorganized and strengthened, so that it can speak with an authoritative voice on matters of concern to its members. It has not hesitated to do so, and its voice was heard and listened to in the debate surrounding the 1964 white paper on 'Aims and Policy for Social Welfare in Hong Kong'. This was a paper prepared with a view to settling the main lines of policy for the sound development of plans for the future. It was as necessary as the reviews of medical and educational policy, indeed perhaps more so because the field is essentially less firmly defined, the area of potential activity almost unlimited and the benefits less easy to measure. It was drawn up in a context which lacked many of the provisions that are common