Remarks by SLW at media session
Following are the remarks by the Secretary for Labour and Welfare, Mr Chris Sun, at a media session after attending a radio programme today morning (June 20):
Reporter: In terms of the Lai King Estate Incident yesterday, is the Government doing enough to locate the hidden elderly and care takers under stress? What's more the Government considering to do in order to stop future tragedies from happening? And regarding the Enhanced Supplementary Labour Scheme, how would that further protect the right of local workers? And would that be enough to deal with possible local unemployment in those sectors as well as striking a balance to make sure business can run probably?
Secretary for Labour and Welfare: I am really saddened by the tragedy yesterday at the Lai King Estate. I've looked back at the case, so for this case, it was not a case being taken care of by the Social Welfare Department or our non-governmental organisations (NGOs). And it is also not on the list we provided to the Care Teams to visit them. If you look deeper into the case, right now, by using big data, with the resident list provided to us by the Housing Department, as a first step, we are targeting all elderly households, who are over the age of 80. But for this case, for the tragedy in Lai King yesterday, both residents aged below 80, one is 78, one is 70.
So the next step for us is, we are looking into the possibility of not just looking at the age. Instead of looking at those all elderly households who are below the age of 80, we are looking at how we can co-operate with the Hospital Authority to include those aged below 80 who are suffering from chronic disease and require constant care. Our thinking is to include them as well.
We are looking along that direction so that we can expand our list of high-risk families. Once the list is expanded, we can hand it over to the Care Teams and visit them. If they are not under the care of our social welfare network, we can refer them to a nearby NGO to take care of them.
As for the Enhanced Supplementary Labour Scheme, our purpose of the new arrangement is to strike a balance and especially to make sure that priority is given to local workers when employers are applying for importing labours from out of Hong Kong. We are having a tier system now. So there are two tiers. For the first tier, it is still using the existing arrangement. For those that are slotting into the second tier, right now it is mainly the food and beverage services sector, they will be subject to much stricter requirements, including the ratio of local to foreign workers. Currently, the ratio for tier one is two to one, but for those being placed in tier two, it is three to one.
The base right now for tier one is the whole corporation. But for the food and beverage services sector, we divide them into two big departments. One is what we call the posts in the table service section, and the other one is the posts in the production section, mainly it's about the kitchen. And also the local recruitment period will be extended from four to six weeks, and they have to come to our local employment centres to interview local workers personally. The requirement is twice every two weeks. So by all these measures, we hope to provide as much opportunities as possible to local workers to get the jobs. But even after that stricter process, if the employers are still not able to recruit enough workers locally, we will allow them to proceed to import workers from outside. Thank you very much.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the remarks.)
Source: AI-found images
Commissioner for Census and Statistics officiates at prize presentation ceremony of 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition for Secondary School Students
The Commissioner for Census and Statistics, Mr Leo Yu, officiated at the prize presentation ceremony of the 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition (SPC) for Secondary School Students co-organised by the Hong Kong Statistical Society and the Education Bureau today (June 20). Principal Assistant Secretary for Education Ms Edith Tse also attended as an officiating guest. The President of the Hong Kong Statistical Society, Professor Chan Ngai-hang; the Chief Adjudicator of the competition, Professor Cheung Ka-chun; Department of Biostatistics of City University of Hong Kong (sponsor of the competition) representative Professor Xu Jinfeng; Department of Decision Analytics and Operations of City University of Hong Kong (sponsor of the thematic prize) representative Professor Du Lilun; and Division of Science, Engineering and Health Studies of the College of Professional and Continuing Education of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (sponsor of the thematic prize) representative Dr Anthony Loh also presented prizes to the winning teams and extended their congratulations to every team member.
Addressing the prize presentation ceremony, Mr Yu emphasised that statistics is a practical, cross-disciplinary science that provides a profound reflection of social and economic conditions, serving as a vital basis for decision-making. In the era of big data and AI, data science skills have become increasingly essential. This competition not only reinforces students' statistical knowledge but also cultivates their problem-solving abilities. He said that under the dedicated guidance of principals and teachers, the entries have grown increasingly diverse in theme and continue to improve in quality, reflecting the education sector's growing emphasis on practical statistics and students' deepening interest and enthusiasm for the subject. He commended the award-winning students for accurately identifying the core of each issue, making extensive use of statistical data to support their research, and presenting their findings through concise, vivid charts that fully demonstrate strong capabilities in both data analysis and visual communication.
This edition of the competition received an encouraging response of 220 statistical projects from about 830 secondary school students, covering a broad spectrum of topics. Participating students were able to utilise official statistics as the main source of data to analyse and interpret social and economic issues in Hong Kong.
The 2025/26 SPC is the 40th edition of the competition. Mr Yu and Deputy Secretary for Education Dr Gloria Chan are the patrons of the competition. Over the past years, many statistician-grade staff members of the Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) have actively participated in the organisation and professional adjudication of the SPC in the capacity of members of the Hong Kong Statistical Society, with the aim of improving statistical literacy among secondary school students and promoting the application and importance of statistics in society. This fully demonstrates that the C&SD attaches great importance and commitment to nurturing young talent.
The key objectives of the competition are to promote the interest of secondary school students in research methods, statistics and statistical techniques; encourage students to understand the local community in a scientific and objective manner through the proper use of statistics; and promote a sense of civic awareness.
Members of the public are welcome to visit the webpage of the competition for the list of winners this year (www.hkss.org.hk/index.php/spc$en).
Commissioner for Census and Statistics officiates at prize presentation ceremony of 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition for Secondary School Students Source: HKSAR Government Press Releases
Commissioner for Census and Statistics officiates at prize presentation ceremony of 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition for Secondary School Students Source: HKSAR Government Press Releases
Commissioner for Census and Statistics officiates at prize presentation ceremony of 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition for Secondary School Students Source: HKSAR Government Press Releases
Commissioner for Census and Statistics officiates at prize presentation ceremony of 2025/26 Statistical Project Competition for Secondary School Students Source: HKSAR Government Press Releases
