Paper Talk
About 2,000 parents flooded into Diocesan Boys' School Primary Division, a prestigious primary school on Argyle Street in Mong Kok, last Saturday for two introductory briefing sessions on Primary One admissions. Most started queuing outside as early as 5am, and some sent their domestic helpers to camp out for the night. Head teacher Phyllis Lo Kam-lai said the school would offer 150 Primary One places in the next school year, but expected to receive more than 3,000 applications.
Children should avoid toys containing aniline, a toxic compound, as it might cause them to develop methaemoglobinaemia, a blood disorder in which the skin changes colour. A doctor at the emergency ward at Caritas Medical Centre in Sham Shui Po said that a few years ago he treated a one-year-old boy who turned completely blue after playing with ink stamps from a US fast-food chain. The boy was saved after several days of detoxification.
Some cultural, art and recreational bodies were found by reporters to have been given funding by district councils to organise community activities every year despite having not filed applications. Eight district councils were found to have granted about HK$7 million in total for the 2015-16 financial year to such bodies whose core members are either district councillors or closely connected.
The Marine Department has been criticised by owners of smaller passenger-carrying vessels who said it had been unfair to them by fully subsidising only the owners of vessels that carry more than 100 passengers to install an automatic identification system recommended by the International Maritime Organisation. The GPS-equipped system, which can lower the chances of collisions between vessels, costs more than HK$20,000. The department said only 12 per cent of passenger-carrying vessels met the criteria for their owners to receive the subsidy.
An MTR staff member outside Sheung Shui station caught the attention of a passer-by by asking an elderly woman passenger with a baby girl in a pram loaded with goods to put both the pram and the girl onto scales, then telling her the pram was overweight and she could not enter. The passer-by asked the lady not to put the baby on the scale. But the staff member insisted the pram had to be weighed with the baby. The rail operator denied this had happened and said the woman had failed to cooperate.
Charges at the paediatric wards of five of the 11 private hospitals in the city probed by reporters have increased by between 4.2 per cent and 30.2 per cent since the end of last year. The largest increase was at Precious Blood Hospital in Sham Shui Po, where the daily charge shot up from HK$1,060 to HK$1,380.
