There has been a series of horrific cases of child abuse in families and in institutions in recent years.

A couple was sentenced to life imprisonment in April last year for the murder of their five-year-old daughter in one of the most serious cases in recent decades.

The couple mistreated the girl from 2017, until she was rushed unconscious to Tuen Mun Hospital in 2018 with her body covered in about 130 injuries.

The girl’s 29-year-old father and 30-year-old stepmother admitted ill-treatment and neglect of the child for about five months, but denied killing her. Her brother was found to have about the same number of injuries on his underweight body.

There were media reports that suggested that teachers were aware of suspicious injuries to the girl and that she was often absent from school. But school staff did not report their concerns to education and social welfare officials as the girl’s parents had promised to stop using corporal punishment on the girl.

Since last December, police have also arrested 34 employees in connection with alleged abuse of 40 youngsters at a residential home in Mong Kok run by the Hong Kong Society for the Protection of Children. At least three of the employees have been jailed for between four months to six and a half months.

The incident sparked a review of the operation of residential care homes in Hong Kong and last month a report was released that suggested that facilities for children should be subject to unannounced check-up visits.

Identities to be kept confidential when reporting abuse: Hong Kong minister

2. What do the laws and guidelines say, and why do they not seem to be adequate?

The Education Bureau revised its guidelines after last April’s murder verdict and required schools to report if a pupil was absent for seven days without a valid reason or under suspicious circumstances. Staff are also required to report injuries suspected to have been caused by abuse.

Under the Offences against the Person Ordinance, anyone who assaults, ill-treats or neglects a child in their care could face up to 10 years behind bars.

But, although family members can also be charged with neglect if they did little to help a victim, professionals such as teachers and social workers do not have a statutory duty to report suspected abuse.

3. What is the government proposing?

Chris Sun Yuk-han, the secretary for labour and welfare, revealed on Wednesday that officials were looking at a three-tier system designed to cover the role of professionals.

He compared the top tier, which concerns the spotting of serious harm or imminent risk of serious injury, with the red signal in a traffic light. These situations must be flagged by professionals, including teachers, social workers, doctors, nurses and psychologists to authorities “within a reasonable time”, or they could face up to three months in jail and a HK$50,000 fine.

But for the second tier, or the “amber signal”, which involves children at risk of harm or who may have been harmed, and where the child’s parents or carers are reluctant to cooperate, then professionals will be “encouraged” to report the case although that will not be mandatory.

The third tier, or the “near-green signal”, covers cases where ill-treatment is not confirmed, but there is a need to follow up with the family involved. These cases should be referred to a “suitable” service unit under the Social Welfare Department.

The identity of childcare professionals who report suspected abuse will be kept confidential.

4. When will this be implemented?

Sun has asked interested parties for their opinions on the proposals and said he hoped to complete the consultative process in one or two months. He added that the amendment bill could be submitted to the legislature in the first half of next year.

But Lee signalled that he hoped the consultation process could be finished in a shorter time frame.

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5. What are the social services sector’s views on these proposals?

Priscilla Lui Tsang Sun-kai, a non-official member of the Commission on Children, suggested that it should also be made mandatory for professionals to report cases in the second tier, where children may already be at risk of harm or had suffered harm.

“Child abuse cases often evolved from being minor to serious ones, or even cases involving death. Preventive measures should always be preferred over remedial ones,” she said.

Professor Lam Ching-man, president of the Hong Kong Social Workers Association, said that some frontline workers were concerned about inadvertently breaching the law under the proposal, because phrases such as “imminent risk of harm to a child”, had not been clarified.

Critics also said it was too vague for the proposed law to require that child abuse cases must be reported within a “reasonable time”.

6. How do other countries deal with child abuse?

Lui proposed that, rather than creating different tiers, Hong Kong should learn from foreign countries where everyone was encouraged to report suspected child abuse, regardless of its seriousness.

“The United States and Australia have established systems for mandatory reporting of all child abuse, not just serious cases, and they have allocated the manpower and resources to handle cases,” she said.

“In New Zealand, the government also said … they will also pay much attention to an official child development index. These are examples that we can learn from.”

Lui highlighted that more than 60 countries or regions around the world had criminalised the corporal punishment of children and said that Hong Kong should do the same.