Report No. 32, March 1999

Chapter 9

Services provided by
the Social Welfare Department for offenders and
children/juveniles in need of care or protection

Summary and key findings

A. Introduction. The Social Welfare Department (SWD) adopts a social work approach to implement the court directives in the treatment of offenders with the aim of helping them become law-abiding citizens. The Corrections Section of the SWD provides community-based services and residential services for offenders. In 1998-99, the expenditure of these two types of services was estimated to be $235.9 million. Audit recently conducted a review on the SWD services for offenders. The audit findings are summarised in paragraphs B to E below. B. Assessment of service effectiveness. In the provision of services for offenders, the SWD aims to help offenders become law-abiding citizens. Therefore, the key indicator of effectiveness of the SWD services for offenders is how far the objective of helping offenders become law-abiding citizens has been achieved. However, the success rate used by the SWD only indicates the percentage of offenders who are able to complete the treatment programmes satisfactorily. The success rate does not indicate whether the offenders are able to become law-abiding citizens after completing the programmes. While reconviction statistics are maintained in the Integrated Law and Order Statistical System (ILOSS), the SWD does not regularly obtain such information for assessing the effectiveness of its services for offenders. Audit considers that the SWD has not fully reaped the intended benefits from the ILOSS. Based on the reconviction statistics of the clients of the SWD programmes, Audit found that the percentage of persons who were able to remain law-abiding dropped significantly just one year after completion of the programmes. In terms of the success in helping offenders become law-abiding citizens, the SWD residential services appeared to be less effective but more expensive than the community-based services (paras. 9 to 24). C. Management of residential homes. The demand for the SWD residential services has declined in recent years. Consequently, the average enrolment rate of the SWD residential homes has been falling. In 1998-99, the average enrolment rate was only 48%. Given the decrease in the demand for and under-utilisation of the SWD residential services, the unit cost of service is high. Although the demand for services declined in recent years, the scale of service provision had not been correspondingly reduced. In 1998-99, on average, one staff was serving slightly less than one resident (paras. 29, 30 and 37 to 40). D. Audit noted that the SWD was in the process of reprovisioning some of its residential homes and rationalising the residential services. The reprovisioning/rationalisation exercise would be completed in early 1999. Audit noted the details of the planned reprovisioning but considers that there is scope for further rationalisation of services. Audit is also concerned about the site utilisation of residential homes in prime urban sites. As prime urban sites are a precious commodity in Hong Kong, Audit considers that there is potential for future redevelopment of the sites occupied by the residential homes (paras. 31 to 35 and 43 to 45). E. Reporting of cost of services. An important source of management information for monitoring the cost-effectiveness of services for offenders is the SWD Controlling Officer Report of the Annual Estimates on the cost of its services. Audit found that the unit cost indicator for residential training had in the past few years been substantially understated as a result of the use of an incorrect formula for its calculation. Audit also noted that the unit cost indicators did not reflect the full cost of the services. A comparison of the costs (including staff oncosts) of treatment programmes for offenders shows that the residential services provided by the SWD are more expensive than the community-based programmes (paras. 51 to 60). F. Audit recommendations. Audit has made the following major recommendations that the Director of Social Welfare should: (a) make full use of the ILOSS information on recidivism for assessing the effectiveness of the SWD services for offenders (first inset of para. 25); (b) consider adopting the percentage of persons with no reconviction record within a specified period of time after completion of the treatment programmes as a key performance indicator (second inset of para. 25); (c) monitor the success rates of various programmes for offenders and investigate the reasons for the relatively lower success rates of the SWD residential services for helping offenders become law-abiding citizens (third inset of para. 25); (d) having regard to the relatively low cost-effectiveness of the SWD residential services, take positive action to improve the quality of services for offenders and the operation and management of residential homes (last inset of para. 25); (e) review whether the current level of supply of residential services is appropriate (para. 46(b)); (f) reassess the staffing requirements of individual residential homes (para. 46(d)); (g) consider the feasibility of merging some of the residential homes and redeveloping the prime urban sites occupied by the residential homes (para. 46(e) and (f)); (h) revise the cost information included in the Controlling Officer Report of the Annual Estimates (first inset of para. 61); and (i) regularly report full unit costs (including staff oncosts) of the SWD services for management information and consider including full unit costs as additional information in the Controlling Officer Report of the Annual Estimates (second and third insets of para. 61). G. Response from the Administration. The Administration agrees with most of the audit recommendations (paras. 26, 27, 47 to 50 and 62 to 64).