‘Significant improvement’ in young people’s willingness to join Hong Kong police, chief says, with growing interest at recruitment events
- Commissioner of Police Raymond Siu says force’s new recruitment strategy has started to show encouraging results
- Event last month received 926 on-the-spot applications, compared with an average of more than 400 for previous ones
Speaking after a passing-out parade at the Hong Kong Police College in Wong Chuk Hang on Saturday, Raymond Siu Chak-yee said the force’s new recruitment strategy had started to show encouraging results.
“We have faced challenges in recruitment in past years … because of a wave of retirement in the force and the establishment of many large-scale infrastructures in the city which need a large amount of manpower from police as well as other disciplined services,” the commissioner of police said.
But since May last year, a “police recruitment experience and assessment day” has been held every quarter to enable those taking part to learn more about the 30,000-strong force.
Siu said the fourth such event on June 19 had attracted an attendance of more than 2,460, compared with an average of 1,463 for the previous three.
Last month’s event received 926 on-the-spot applications, compared with an average of more than 400 for the previous ones. Among them, 657 applications were for police constable, a surge from an average of about 200 in the first three events.
“We have seen that the willingness among young people to join the police force has improved significantly,” he said. “The result is encouraging.”