New measures to stem cases of bullying

Education officials are to launch new measures to combat bullying in secondary schools, which will include hiring 1,000 assistants for school social workers. The plan was included in a paper on bullying submitted to legislators by the Education Bureau this week. The paper stated there had been 'no significant changes' in the pattern of bullying over the past three years, based on a survey of 1,000 primary and secondary schools that found there had been between 247 and 401 cases requiring teacher intervention each year. There were roughly twice as many cases in secondaries than in primary schools.