Hong Kong’s revamped social worker regulator has paused appointments to a panel previously criticised for including a member facing rioting charges, the body’s head has said, stressing the need to select candidates with a “clean background and good reputation”.
Herman Hui Chung-shing, chairman of the Social Workers Registration Board which oversees 27,000 professionals in the sector, said on Saturday he hoped the candidates for its disciplinary committee panel would be reviewed as soon as possible before the list of appointees was gazetted.
“We need to present an image that everyone can accept, at least that the public can accept. We don’t want to have any flaws which make people doubt whether the cases handled by the team are convincing,” he said.
“Therefore, they are not only required to have a truly clean background and a good reputation, but we also pay attention to their image.”
Authorities made new appointments to the board last month after the passage of legislative amendments that authorities earlier insisted were needed to depoliticise a sector whose members were seen as sympathetic to protesters during the 2019 social unrest.
The amendments allowed the body to permanently disqualify those convicted of national security offences and certain other crimes, and also increased the number of government-appointed members on the board from six to 17. Seats allocated to elected representatives remained at eight.
The move followed the accusations by authorities that the board failed to take firm action to prevent people convicted of national security offences from registering to join the profession.
Secretary for Labour and Welfare Chris Sun Yuk-han earlier flagged the case of a social worker who had an ongoing court case over rioting charges but was still appointed to the board’s disciplinary committee panel despite objections from their peers.
The minister did not name anyone, but social worker Jackie Chen Hung-sau questioned whether he was referring to her case.
Chen was acquitted in 2021 as the court ruled prosecutors had failed to establish a prima facie case against her. But the Court of Appeal allowed the case to proceed.
Hui, a lawyer and veteran adviser to authorities, said after assuming the position that his priorities included dealing with social workers convicted of national security offences and other serious crimes, and setting up a mechanism to fairly handle those with court cases on the disciplinary committee panel.
