Tolerance of child abuse 'hidden crisis'
By Eddie Luk (China Daily HK Edition)
Updated: 2004-06-19 09:21

Hong Kong's high tolerance of child abuse may lead to a social crisis, according to a child welfare activist.

The warning came from Priscilla Lui Tsang Sun-kai, director of Against Child Abuse (ACA), who said that protection for children has never been a priority in the city.

Instead, she said, the government concentrates its resources on fostering economic development.

Lui has been engaged in a child-protection campaign in Hong Kong for more than 22 years since she set up ACA - the first Hong Kong registered non-governmental organization to combat child abuse. "I feel people in Hong Kong are tolerant of child abuse," she said. "It is as if the whole of society is suffering from Child Abuse Accommodation Syndrome," Lui said.

The syndrome refers to victims responding to abuse by accepting the situation since they see no way of escape. The victims usually keep the abuse a secret or delay reporting the abuse to avoid destruction of their families.

Lui said, "Our society has shown accommodation to the child abuse problem and people have turned a blind eye to it. Only the severe abuse cases in which victims are close to death will be exposed and cause the concern of society."

Lui cited an example of a seven-year-old girl who was found unconscious and taken to hospital by a passer-by last year.

Only then was it discovered that the girl had been physically abused by her parents and suffered from malnutrition.

The Social Welfare Department was actually aware of her case several years ago. Lui wondered why neither the police, nor social workers nor school teachers took any action to end the abuse.

Prompted by the Tin Shui Wai tragedy in which a woman and her daughters were believed to have been killed by her husband at home, the government is currently reviewing issues of prevention, identification and handling in child abuse cases.

Although supporting the move, Lui believed the occurrence of severe abuse cases was not a result of unclear or inadequate procedural guidelines. "We have a set of comprehensive and updated guidelines provided to police, social workers and other related government departments," she said.

The problem is that the enforcers of the guidelines did not grasp the child protection spirit.

"I know that there is a lack of training provided to frontline social workers, teachers and other professionals. They don't have adequate knowledge and skills to identify and deal with victims."

Lui said it is necessary to enhance awareness among frontline workers dealing with child protection.

Another obstacle in curbing child abuse in Hong Kong is parents' misunderstanding on child protection.

"In Chinese society, corporal punishment to discipline children is acceptable. And parents think that advocating child rights means that they would be unable to discipline children. Such wrong attitudes and thinking explains why physical child abuse cases are so prevalent in society," she said.

Lui said the existing tense social atmosphere and financial straits for some families have made children increasingly vulnerable.

She said, "As our society is facing a budget deficit with an intense atmosphere, the government has a focus on carrying out policy and allocating resources to stimulate the economy. As such, child protection and anti-domestic violence policy has been ranked in low priority."

Amid budget cuts of the welfare sector by the government this year, social-welfare organizations have worked on a tight budget and severe shortages of manpower.

Earlier the government announced a 2.5 per cent funding cut to social service organizations beginning this fiscal year.

ACA is one of the affected organizations and the government may slash about HK$1.1 million funding to the institution.

"Our organization staff have faced great working pressure," she said. "When our economy is sagging, the number of child abuse and domestic violence cases has increased and those cases have become complex.

"But we don't have sufficient manpower to meet with an increased workload. So we have to be hard to guarantee our service quality," she said.

In the near future, Lui said her institution is planning to cut some services, including offering home visits and counselling services to the pregnant, which she believed could help prevent child abuse and family violence cases.

Lui noted that citizens should realize that everyone has a responsibility to combat child abuse in society.

According to government figures, the number of child abuse cases reported to police over the past three years was 1,078, 1,044 and 1,028 respectively. And the Social Welfare Department has handled about 150 new child abuse cases each year.

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