FS visits Islands District (with photos)
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     The Financial Secretary, Mr Paul Chan, visited Island District this afternoon (April 20). Apart from meeting with members of the Islands District Council (IDC), he also met with the elderly and secondary school students in the district.
      
     Mr Chan first met with members of the IDC to learn more about the latest developments of the district and to exchange views on matters of mutual interest.
      
     Accompanied by the District Officer (Islands), Mr Anthony Li; the Chairman of the IDC, Mr Chow Yuk-tong; and others, Mr Chan then met with the elderly at the Tung Chung Integrated Services Centre of the Neighbourhood Advice-Action Council.
      
     The Centre provides social, recreational, educational and volunteer activities to some 500 elderly members. It also provides services to elderly singletons, elderly doubletons and carers for the elderly to help them make good use of resources and services available within the community.
      
     Mr Chan said that supporting the disadvantaged and building a caring and inclusive society are high on the Government’s agenda. For improving elderly services, he has allocated resources in the Budget for implementing an array of measures set out in the Policy Address. These measures include increasing the number of vouchers under the Pilot Scheme on Community Care Service Voucher for the Elderly and setting up the Innovation and Technology Fund for Application in Elderly and Rehabilitation Care. Additional resources will also be allocated for speech therapy services for elderly service units, benefiting some 22 000 elderly persons with swallowing difficulties or speech impairment.
      
     Later, Mr Chan visited Buddhist Fat Ho Memorial College in Tai O, where he spoke with the students and watched their talent performances. The College accepts non-Chinese students of different nationalities and helps ethnic minority students to integrate into society through various extra-curricular activities, such as lion dancing, cheering team activities and a Cantonese opera for non-Chinese students scheme.
      
     Mr Chan said that upon taking office, the current-term Government has pledged to increase recurrent expenditure on education by $5 billion, of which $3.6 billion has been approved by the Legislative Council.  He has proposed in the Budget to provide an additional recurrent expenditure of $2 billion to achieve quality education. The initiatives to be launched include enhancing the professional development of teachers, strengthening support for kindergartens, reviewing and improving integrated education, and supporting schools in enhancing promotion of life-wide learning.  The Government will also earmark resources to set up a new Student Activities Support Fund, and to inject funding into the Gifted Education Fund and the HKSAR Government Scholarship Fund, to help nurture future talent for Hong Kong.
     

Ends/Friday, April 20, 2018
Issued at HKT 19:18

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