Budget Speech

Supporting Rehabilitation of Persons with Disabilities

141.      I will provide additional recurrent funding of about $100 million to enhance services for persons with disabilities. About $60 million will be used to provide 268 additional subvented residential care places for persons with disabilities, 154 additional places for pre-school rehabilitation services and 260 additional places for day training and vocational rehabilitation services. About $40 million will be used to strengthen such support services as physiotherapy and nursing care for elderly residents in subvented residential care homes for persons with intellectual disability. I will also provide additional funding of about $8 million to increase the number of Rehabuses to 119 by acquiring four new buses and replacing six old ones.

142.      We will regulate the residential care homes for persons with disabilities through a statutory licensing scheme. Before the scheme is launched, we will introduce complementary measures to encourage operators of private residential care homes to improve their service quality, increase the provision of subsidised residential care places, and facilitate the market to develop residential care homes of different types and modes of operation. I have earmarked $64 million under the Lotteries Fund to implement a pilot Bought Place Scheme for residential care homes for persons with disabilities. The Social Welfare Department will finalise the operational details of the scheme as soon as possible.

143.      Moreover, I will earmark $163 million under the Lotteries Fund to implement a pilot scheme to provide persons with severe disabilities with home-based nursing care services, with a view to strengthening the community support to persons with disabilities and relieving the pressure on their family carers. The pilot scheme will be launched in Kwun Tong and Tuen Mun, where there are more persons with severe disabilities on the waiting lists for residential care home places.

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