More funds for voluntary Tin Shui Wai aid groups
Voluntary groups helping residents in Tin Shui Wai are to get more money from the government.
The Home Affairs Department said yesterday it had earmarked about HK$2 million for mutual aid committees in the remote new town for the coming year.
The department said each committee would be able to apply for sponsorship of up to HK$20,000 to organise one or more events in 2007-08 'to promote a closer and caring mutual help network in the neighbourhood'.
The money is in addition to an annual HK$4,000 subsidy paid to each mutual aid committee in public housing blocks under the management of the Housing Authority.
The committees - voluntary bodies formed by residents to hold social activities - can submit proposals for the funds by the end of the year.
Meanwhile, more than 2,100 people turned up at a catering recruitment expo in Tin Shui Wai yesterday competing for more than 700 jobs.
A Labour Department spokeswoman said 186 people had received job offers at the fair, held by the Federation of Restaurants and Related Trades and the Labour Department on Tin Chak Estate.
'It's the first time we've held a recruitment drive in Tin Shui Wai,' federation chairman Ken Chan Wing-on said. 'It is a win-win situation. There has been a labour shortage in the catering industry recently and residents here eagerly need jobs.'
The Labour Department said that out of the more than 700 jobs available, nearly 300 were in the northwestern New Territories, with salaries ranging from HK$5,000 to HK$10,000 a month.
More than 80 per cent required just Form Three education or lower and 70 per cent were suitable for novices, it said.
Cafe de Coral assistant director Albert Wan Ming said the fast-food chain was considering holding another recruitment expo in the new town this month. The chain plans to recruit about 400 Tin Shui Wai residents to work at its restaurants in Kowloon and Hong Kong Island, and free transport will be provided.
Time spent commuting to work would be counted as working hours but the time for the return trip would be excluded, Mr Wan said.
The company had already made arrangements for coaches but whether the plan could be realised would depend on the response to the recruitment drive, he said.
'It will depend on whether they are willing to cross districts to work and how many people will apply,' Mr Wan said, adding starting salaries ranged from HK$5,000 to HK$10,000.
The federation's Mr Chan, also managing director of Tai Hing Roast Restaurant Group, an exhibitor at yesterday's fair, said the group would also consider offering free transport.
He said the group had about 60 openings in Yuen Long, Tuen Mun and Tsuen Wan, and planned to open five or six restaurants next year.
