Government social workers supporting survivors of Hong Kong’s deadly Tai Po fire are struggling to manage their “indefinite” duties, with poor communication about new initiatives compounding the stress of their already heavy caseloads.
Several social workers, including a union leader, told the South China Morning Post that they needed clarity from authorities on their roles and duties to better manage public expectations and ensure relevant agencies, such as the Housing Bureau, could help address complex frontline questions.
The call for more support follows the death of a social worker, under the government’s “one social worker per household” initiative, who collapsed on the street in late January and later died.
While the official cause of death has not been made public, the case has sparked concern about the heavy workload and stress faced by frontline staff.
“When we heard about the death of that colleague, we were not only sad but also worried that we might be the next one,” said one social worker, who has been with the Social Welfare Department for a few years and agreed to speak on condition of anonymity.
The “one social worker per household” initiative was launched a day after the fire broke out in Tai Po’s Wang Fuk Court in late November. One dedicated worker was assigned to each of the 1,984 families to provide comprehensive support, from subsidy applications to grief counselling.
Nearly all of the department’s social workers were mobilised, with director Edward To Wing-hang saying in December that they were required to provide mobile phone numbers so they could be contacted by survivors after office hours and serve the families for an “indefinite period of time”.
The social worker said that 2½ months after the fire, the heavy workload had not eased much. A key problem was the government’s lack of communication on new initiatives that social workers were expected to implement before fully understanding the plans.
“We often learn about our tasks from the news; no one told us that we needed to deliver resettlement surveys or help to administer the HK$5,000 [US$640] donations from the Han Hong Love Charity Foundation before the news was reported,” the worker said.
The lack of communication often resulted in a rush to execute tasks they had not fully absorbed, leading clients to blame social workers for failing to deliver aid efficiently or answer questions, especially on resettlement arrangements, the person added.
New tasks were also piled on to workers’ existing responsibilities. The frontliner said each social worker typically had 40 to 80 cases to handle, some of which could be high-risk – such as those involving domestic violence – that required regular check-ins.
“As we are trying hard to catch up with all the clients, then came the fee waiver crisis and the new child abuse reporting law in January – it’s simply overwhelming for us,” the person said.
In January, social workers were overwhelmed by an influx of medical fee waiver applications as fee increases at public hospitals began.
The Mandatory Reporting of Child Abuse Ordinance, which requires 25 professions, including social workers, to report suspected cases, also took effect on January 20.
Conscious of a need to provide greater support, the government lifted the cap on compensation leave for social workers and allowed them to claim taxi fares.
It also allowed other civil servants who were not social workers to be deployed for certain tasks, such as collecting donations for families in need on a voluntary basis.
But the frontline social worker said the arrangement was inefficient, as public servants who volunteered had to seek approval each time they received a request for help, no matter how urgent the appeal was.
As most people who lost their homes in the Tai Po fire had settled down in some form of alternative or temporary housing, the frontline worker urged the government to turn part of its attention to the overworked social workers helping those families.
The frontliner called on authorities to communicate better to clarify the workers’ duties, manage public expectations and enable agencies such as the Housing Bureau to help answer questions at the frontline.
“We as government social workers are the safety net, but if the net itself is fraying, we can hardly be expected to function as well.”
Sam Leung Kin-hung, chairman of the General Union of Social Workers in Social Welfare Department, proposed establishing a mechanism that would notify employees of new tasks in advance to help them anticipate their workload.
“We are often the ones coordinating and delivering the aid that has been pouring in from different departments and charities, but they often announce the good news without looping us in in advance,” he said.
In such instances, social workers had to navigate multiple levels of internal inquiry to obtain official instructions, resulting in a time lag in service delivery that affected public satisfaction, he said.
Like the frontline employee, Leung called on authorities to rethink the need for social workers to be available after office hours, as the most acute stage of relief for fire victims had passed.
In the longer run, he said the government should also review case assignments to better match social workers with the needs of clients, to improve rather than impede service delivery.
Leung cited the long distances that some social workers must travel to visit their clients and the deployment of back-end staff from headquarters to the front line, although they had not done case management for years and were not familiar with available resources.
The situation was especially difficult for social workers handling families with complex needs, such as those with elderly members and people with disabilities under the same roof and already on multiple welfare payouts.
“The current arrangement is not necessarily the most helpful for clients,” he said.
“It would be more effective in terms of service delivery and quality if the cases could be reassigned based on locations, once the clients have more certainty on where they will live long term.”
In response, the department said it acknowledged the high volume of information and had been providing real-time updates to frontline workers through instant messaging. It has also deployed civil servants and NGO staff to help share the “heavy workload”, with allowance applications simplified and overtime compensation provided to social workers.
“The department will continue to monitor the working conditions of colleagues and review the arrangement in a timely manner,” a spokesman said. -- SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST
