PUBLIC ASSISTANCE RECIPIENTS RECEIVING SUPPLEMENTARY AID (Rationale for discontinuance)

Mr Ho See Beng asked the Acting Minister for Social Affairs what is the rationale for stopping payment of public assistance allowances to recipients who are also receiving financial aid from friends or relatives, and whether he is aware that the dole paid is inadequate for the recipients to make ends meet unless they can supplement their dole by some other means.

The Senior Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Social Affairs (Mr Chan Chee Seng) (for the Acting Minister for Social Affairs): Mr Speaker, Sir, if I may take the second limb of the hon. Member's question first. My Minister has stated in this House before that public assistance allowances are not enough to meet all the basic needs of the recipient. Indeed, it is not intended that they should be. The Social Welfare Department does not see its role as the mere handing out of public assistance allowances. If a public assistance recipient is physically able to work, the Department will find him light work or part-time work so that his earnings, together with his public assistance allowance, will be adequate for subsistence. In the case of the less fortunate ones who are unable to take on any kind of work, the Department will arrange supplementary assistance from privately administered charitable funds.

A number of public assistance recipients do, of course, receive financial aid from friends and relatives. It is not true to say that a recipient will lose his public assistance allowance if he receives any aid from friends and relatives. On the contrary, as I said earlier, the Social Welfare Department recognises that the public assistance allowance by itself is not enough for subsistence and needs to be supplemented.

The grant of public assistance allowance will be stopped if the Social Welfare Department is satisfied that a recipient has close relatives, for example, children or nephews and nieces or brothers and sisters, who are in a position to support him. In each case, the Department will make extensive investigations to ascertain the financial circumstances of the relatives. I can assure the hon. Member that the recipient will not lose his public assistance allowance if the relatives, who are in difficult financial straits themselves, can only give him occasional help.

Mr Ho See Beng: Mr Speaker, Sir, will the Senior Parliamentary Secretary assure me that he will look into the matter if I can refer him to cases of recipients whose doles have been withdrawn on the ground that they are receiving financial aid from their friends?

Mr Chan Chee Seng: Sir, we will look into those cases, and if the assistance given is inadequate, we will consider them.