Facing the ever-changing challenges in meeting the needs of our society, the Social Welfare Department (SWD) upholds the vision of building a caring community by paying full efforts to provide care for the elderly and strengthen the support for the disadvantaged. Our earnest efforts and commitment to supporting the needy are fully reflected in the huge rise in expenditure in the past few years. In the 2016-17, the Government's actual recurrent expenditure on social welfare reached $63.5 billion, accounting for 18.4% of the total recurrent government expenditure, the second highest among all policy areas. When compared with the figure in the 2012-13 Actual ($44.5 billion), the actual recurrent expenditure on social welfare had increased by 42.7%.
Poverty Alleviation
Ever since the setting up of the Commission on Poverty, SWD has been actively participating in the work of alleviating poverty and rendering support to individuals and families with special needs. In the past two years, SWD has launched three new assistance programmes under the Community Care Fund (CCF), and participated in an assistance programme under the administration of Food and Health Bureau with some individual assistance programmes relaunched and enhanced as well.
Elderly Care
The size of the elderly population (i.e. those aged 65 or above) will increase from 1.12 million (or 15.3% of total population) in 2015 to 2.514 million (or 30.6% of total population) in 2043, and further to 2.58 million (or 33.1% of total population) in 2064. In face of the challenges posed by an ageing population, we uphold the established policy direction of "ageing-in-place as the core, institutional care as back-up", reckoning that community care services should be strengthened. To seize every opportunity to improve community care services for the elderly, we have implemented a number of pilot schemes to support elderly persons in the community.
The Second Phase of the Pilot Scheme on Community Care Service Voucher for the Elderly (CCSV) has been implemented in October 2016. With the experience gained from the CCSV, SWD launched the Pilot Scheme on Residential Care Service Voucher for the Elderly (RCSV) in March 2017. The RCSV, still adopting the "money-following-the-user" principle, provides an additional choice for elderly persons in need of residential care service by allowing them to choose the services provided by eligible residential care homes for the elderly. Moreover, a two-year Pilot Scheme on Dementia Community Support Scheme has been launched in 2017 jointly with the Hospital Authority (HA) to enhance care for elderly persons with dementia at community level.
Support for the Disadvantaged
We have bolstered support for persons with disabilities in the past two years. Measures included providing additional places of various rehabilitation services, stepping up support for ex-mentally ill persons through integrated community centres for mental wellness and inviting the CCF to implement a pilot scheme to provide low income carers of persons with disabilities with a living allowance to help supplement their living expenses. We have rolled out a two-year Pilot Scheme on On-site Pre-school Rehabilitation Services in 2015. With the success of the scheme to meet the training needs of the children, recurrent expenditure has been earmarked to convert the scheme into a regular government subsidy programme after its conclusion.
Social Security
In addition to continuing with the implementation of the Old Age Living Allowance (OALA) and Guangdong Scheme (GD Scheme) under the Social Security Allowance (SSA) Scheme, we are going to enhance the OALA to strengthen the support of social security pillar to the elderly persons.
Youth Support
We have continued to be entrusted with the operational responsibility of the Child Development Fund, which received an additional injection of $300 million in 2015-16 to promote the long-term development of children aged between 10 and 16 or studying primary four to secondary four from disadvantaged background. Besides, matching grants are provided through the Partnership Fund for the Disadvantaged to encourage the business sector to work with organisations and schools to implement more after-school learning and support programmes for primary and secondary students from grassroot families to facilitate their whole-person development under a dedicated portion of the Fund.
All these measures are by no means exhaustive. We demonstrate our courage and determination to tackle problems and will never recoil from difficulties. With our determination and the concerted efforts made by the welfare sector, the business sector, other government departments and the community, we will build a harmonious society with warmth and happiness.
Carol YIP
Director of Social Welfare