About ERB - Executive Director's Message

Moving away from the shade of economic downturn, Hong Kong's unemployment rate has subsided to its lowest level since 1998. Although it reflects a flourishing employment market, structural unemployment and labour mismatch are still bothering us. There remains a keen demand for retraining services.

To match the aspiration of the society, the government has extended the target beneficiaries of the Employees Retraining service by relaxing the eligibility criteria to people aged 15 or above and with education attainment of sub-degree or below. In line with this change, the ERB will increase the number of retraining places by 10,000 to 107,000 for 2007-08, of which about 63% or 67,000 places will be placement-tied. Retraining places will be increased to 150,000 in 2008-09, and to 200,000 in 2009-10.

In order to provide incentive and the necessary resources to training bodies to develop new courses with market potential, the Board has introduced a "Course Development Assistance Scheme" and "Training Facilities Assistance Scheme" in 2007-08 and reserved $1 million for the purpose. Suitable measures are taken to support training bodies to develop new courses, aiming to broaden retrainees' scope of employment.

Guided by the Board's direction of "Providing optimal training, Enhancing Quality, Strengthening Recognition and Boosting Employment", we are at present focusing on the development of the healthcare massage employment market. By proactively exploring new service platforms other than traditional massage parlours, we aim to fortify users' recognition and confidence towards our "Healthcare Massage Integrated Service". We have set up 4 Regional Service Centres to expand the employers' network locally, and to provide referral and support services for both clients and the massage workers. With "healthcare masseur" as the starting point, we have introduced the "National Vocational Skill Assessment" to our graduates to avail themselves of the opportunity to gain employment in the Mainland through acquisition of the requisite qualification.

To provide a more comprehensive service, we shall re-position our popular "Local Domestic Helper Integrated Scheme" (LDH) into an expanded one-stop referral platform on a greater variety of household services. Apart from domestic helpers, members of the public may also recruit trained and qualified workers for services like post-natal care, child care and home care for the elderly through this service portal.

We would carry on to develop the employment market on healthcare services, hotel and catering as well as customer services, and to launch new retraining courses in response to changes of the market trend. In 2007-08, we would introduce new retraining courses for environmental hygiene and cleaning workers, pest control workers, horticulture workers, laundry assistants and hotel public area cleaners, thus providing our retrainees with more diversified choices. Meanwhile, we have launched retraining courses in English to meet the needs of non-Chinese speaking citizens hence enhancing their employability.

We are strengthening our quality assurance mechanism to ensure that all courses we offer are up to the required standard thus gaining recognition under the Qualifications Framework (QF). In line with the development of the QF, we would start offering retraining courses on property management based on the relevant "Specification of Competency Standards", enabling our retrainees to establish progression ladders under the QF.

The Employees Retraining Scheme is a client-oriented service. While we are incessantly developing new services, we are mindful of the need for continuous improvement to ensure that our training courses and services will bring genuine and sustainable benefits to citizens in need.

Ms Rebecca Pun, JP joined the Hong Kong Government in July 1987 as an Administrative Officer. Her present rank is Administrative Officer Staff Grade B. She has worked in a number of different posts in the Government since, including the former Health and Welfare Branch, Yau Tsim Mong District Office of the Home Affairs Department, the Judiciary and the former Education and Manpower Bureau (EMB). Her major responsibilities in the then EMB included the development and implementation of a Qualifications Framework and an associated Quality Assurance mechanism; the development of Project Yi Jin and Yi Jin/Secondary Schools Collaboration Project; and serving the Manpower Development Committee. She assumed the post of Executive Director, Employees Retraining Board in April 2006.

Ms Pun holds a Bachelor degree in Civil Engineering from The University of Birmingham, UK; a Bachelor degree in Laws from The University of London, UK; and an Executive Master degree in Business Administration from The Chinese University of Hong Kong.