LCQ21: Pre-school rehabilitation services

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Following is a question by the Hon Ngan Man-yu and a written reply by the Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Chris Sun, in the Legislative Council today (December 14):

Question:

It is learnt that pre-school rehabilitation services are crucial to the long-term growth and development of children with special needs, as well as their future integration into mainstream education. The Government is catching up with the lag in respect of this category of services, and has set a target of zero waiting time for pre-school rehabilitation services. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:

(1) regarding the four types of pre-school rehabilitation services (i.e. (a) on-site pre-school rehabilitation services, (b) early education and training centres, (c) integrated programmes in kindergarten-cum-child care centres and (d) special child care centres), of a breakdown of the following information by district: (i) the latest numbers of service places, (ii) the latest numbers of persons waitlisted and (iii) the latest average waiting time (months) (set out such information according to the format of the following table);

District	(i)/(ii)/(iii)
	Pre-school rehabilitation services
	(a)	(b)	(c)	(d)
Kwai Tsing and Tsuen Wan
Kwai Chung
Tsing Yi
Tsuen Wan
Subtotal/average waiting time:
North District, Tai Po and Sha Tin
North District (Sheung Shui and Fanling)
Sha Tin
Tai Po
Subtotal/average waiting time:
Tuen Mun, Yuen Long and Tin Shui Wai
Tin Shui Wai
Tuen Mun
Yuen Long
Subtotal/average waiting time:
Hong Kong and Islands
Central and Western District
Eastern District
Islands District
Southern District
Wan Chai
Subtotal/average waiting time:
East Kowloon
Kwun Tong
Tseung Kwan O
Wong Tai Sin
Subtotal/average waiting time:
West Kowloon
Kowloon City
Mong Kok
Sham Shui Po
Yau Ma Tei
Subtotal/average waiting time:
Total/average waiting time of the aforesaid districts:

(2) of the measures introduced in the past three years by the Government to shorten the waiting time in order to achieve the target of zero waiting time for pre-school rehabilitation services, and whether it has evaluated the effectiveness of such measures; and

(3) whether it has considered reviewing afresh the contents and positioning of the various aforesaid pre-school rehabilitation services, including their service features, demand and quality, with a view to providing appropriate services for children with special needs and their family members?

Reply:

President,

My reply to the question raised by the Member is as follows:

(1) (i) Based on the 11 administrative districts of the Social Welfare Department (SWD), the numbers of service places of Early Education and Training Centre (EETC), Integrated Programme in Kindergarten-cum-Child Care Centre (IP) and Special Child Care Centre (SCCC) are set out in Table 1. The places of On-site Pre-school Rehabilitation Services (OPRS) are allocated on an agency basis and the SWD does not have readily available information on the geographical distribution of such places. In the 2022/23 academic year, there are 10 074 OPRS places in total.

Table 1

District	Number of service places (as at March 31, 2022)
District	EETC	IP	SCCC
Central/Western/Southern and Islands	473	132	313
Eastern/Wan Chai	401	186	216
Kwun Tong	390	228	186
Wong Tai Sin/Sai Kung	604	240	425
Kowloon City/Yau Tsim Mong	231	210	30
Sham Shui Po	400	108	235
Sha Tin	381	168	138
Tai Po/North	487	168	299
Yuen Long	172	186	108
Tsuen Wan/Kwai Tsing	406	198	180
Tuen Mun	229	156	144
Total	4 174	1 980	2 274

(ii) Based on the SWD's 11 administrative districts, the numbers of persons waitlisting for various pre-school rehabilitation services are set out in Table 2.

Table 2

District	Number of waitlisted persons (as at March 31, 2022)
District	OPRS	EETC	IP	SCCC
Central/Western/Southern and Islands	241	99	23	98
Eastern/Wan Chai	217	120	37	126
Kwun Tong	248	106	70	86
Wong Tai Sin/Sai Kung	267	133	69	98
Kowloon City/Yau Tsim Mong	205	138	56	99
Sham Shui Po	143	79	40	61
Sha Tin	242	84	37	92
Tai Po/North	224	122	46	94
Yuen Long	353	141	70	214
Tsuen Wan/Kwai Tsing	280	124	47	112
Tuen Mun	283	112	46	88
Total	2 703 (Note)	1 258 (Note)	541 (Note)	1 168 (Note)

Note: The figure does not include pre-school rehabilitation service users who are now receiving EETC or OPRS as transitional service, or users who are waiting for a change of service type/choice of centre.

(iii) The average waiting time for various pre-school rehabilitation services in 2021-22 is set out in Table 3. The SWD does not have information on the waiting time by district.

Table 3

Average waiting time for 2021-22 (in months)
OPRS	EETC	IP	SCCC
4.3	5.4	6.3	20.2

(2) With a view to achieving the objective of zero waiting time for OPRS, the Government regularised OPRS in 2018 and increased the number of service places from 3 000 in 2018 to over 10 000 in 2022/23 school year. The average waiting time for OPRS decreased from 4.8 months in 2019-20 to 4.3 months in 2021-22. The Government will keep in view the demand and supply of OPRS with a view to achieving zero waiting time for OPRS.

(3) Following the strategic recommendations of the Persons with Disabilities and Rehabilitation Programme Plan, the Government will, upon substantial shortening of the waiting time, reposition various pre-school rehabilitation services for further enhancing services, so as to achieve the target of early intervention.

Ends/Wednesday, December 14, 2022
Issued at HKT 11:07

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