The SWD has 11 FCPSUs across the territory as specialised units to assist families with problems of child abuse and spouse/cohabitant battering in order to restore the normal functioning of these families and to safeguard the interests of children affected by custody/guardianship disputes.

The Victim Support Programme for Victims of Family Violence (VSP) operated by Po Leung Kuk aims to enhance support services to victims of domestic violence, including those undergoing the judicial process. Through the VSP, the victims will be provided with information on the legal proceedings and community support services (such as legal aid service, accommodation, medical treatment and child care support). They will also be provided with emotional support and company while going through the judicial process to alleviate their fear and sense of helplessness. Through close collaboration with case workers, the VSP empowers and assists the victims to resume normal life as early as possible. The VSP served 806 and 756 victims and their family members respectively in 2015-16 and 2016-17.

The refuge centres for women provide temporary accommodation service for women with or without children who are facing domestic violence or having serious personal problems or family crisis. At present, there are five refuge centres with 268 places. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, the average utilisation rates of the five refuge centres were 93.9% and 92.2% respectively.

The Family Crisis Support Centre (FCSC) operated by Caritas - Hong Kong, aims at tackling family crisis at an early stage by providing a package of integrated and easily accessible services to assist individuals and families in crisis or distress. Services provided include a 24-hour hotline, emergency intervention with short-term accommodation and other support services. Besides, the FCSC has established an effective referral network and collaboration with other service organisations and professionals in serving individuals/families in crisis. As at 31 March 2017, 82% of the service users have indicated positive response in overcoming the immediate crisis upon leaving the FCSC.

The CEASE Crisis Centre, operated by the Tung Wah Group of Hospitals, aims to provide comprehensive support to victims of sexual violence and individuals or families facing domestic violence or in crisis, and to link them with appropriate health care and social services units as soon as possible for necessary protection and services. Services provided include a 24-hour hotline and crisis intervention/immediate outreaching service for victims of sexual violence and elder abuse after office hours of the SWD. Besides, the Centre provides short-term accommodation for victims who are temporarily not suitable to return home or individuals/families in crisis. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, the Centre provided services to a total of 444 and 467 victims of sexual violence respectively.

The Suicide Crisis Intervention Centre (SCIC), operated by The Samaritan Befrienders Hong Kong (SBHK), provides round-the-clock outreaching, crisis intervention/intensive counselling to persons in crisis situation and at high/moderate suicidal risks. Apart from the core crisis intervention service, the SCIC also works with SBHK's Life Education Centre and Hotline Centre and other related organisations to render preventive and supportive services, promote the message of cherishing life to the general public especially students, and train up life ambassadors to conduct suicide watch in the community. In view of the ever-increasing use of information technology, the SCIC conducts regular searches on blogs and social media with wording of suicide, for early identification of Internet users with suicidal tendency, and provides web-engagement service such as setting up forum, email-box, chat-room and Internet resource corner to reach out to Internet users with suicidal ideation, ventilate their emotion, give emotional support, promote positive life attitude and provide related social service to the users and to convey meaningful and positive life attitude.

In reducing the risk of domestic violence, it is necessary to break the cycle of violence. Services for batterers have been another important work focus of the SWD since 2008. The Batterer Intervention Programme (BIP) in group format has formally become an integrated component of the counselling service for batterers provided by the 11 FCPSUs, apart from individual counselling and therapy. The SWD has also started a trial project on the development of a BIP for female batterers since 2010. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, a total of 105 batterers participated in the BIP.

To tie in with the implementation of the Domestic Violence (Amendment) Ordinance 2008, the SWD launched the Anti-violence Programme (AVP) in August 2008, which was a psycho-educational programme of 12 to 14 individual or group sessions, aiming at helping abusers of different types who molest the spouses, partners, children or family members to stop such behaviour. As at the end of March 2017, there were 7 referrals from the Court for the AVP. Among them, one was later withdrawn by the applicant and one was passed back to the Court for disposal as the abuser refused to attend the programme.

Because not every abuser is required to attend the AVP as directed by the Court, or willing to join the BIP for a long duration, the SWD thus launched the Educational Programme on Stopping Domestic Violence (EPSDV) in October 2013. The programme provides 6-hour individual or group sessions for batterers or those who pose a risk of perpetrating intimate partner violence to master basic and practical knowledge and skills to manage their anger, resolve conflicts with partners and avoid the outbreak of violence, while helping participants to deal with the crisis caused by the violence and improve partner relationships. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, a total of 354 people had completed the programme.

In 2001, the SWD set up a multi-disciplinary Working Group on Elder Abuse (WGEA) to examine jointly the phenomenon of elder abuse in Hong Kong and provide advice on strategies and ways of handling elder abuse. The WGEA focuses on enhancing community awareness on elder abuse, including the awareness of frontline personnel of concerned disciplines. With the service infrastructure established, the work focus has evolved from a remedial-oriented approach to a more preventive approach such as identifying risk factors of elder abuse cases and formulating preventive measures. In order to sustain the momentum in public education and in view of the cultural background of the society, empowerment of the elderly as part of our preventive strategies will continue to be SWD's major focus. Furthermore, attention will be placed on identifying high risk groups for more targeted intervention.

In 2015-16 and 2016-17, the SWD continued to provide training on core themes of domestic violence such as understanding and handling child abuse, spouse/cohabitant battering, elder abuse and sexual violence. A total of around 15 500 social workers and other professionals participated in the training courses organised at the central level and by district social welfare offices.

In 2015-16, the SWD launched a Facebook fanpage to promote the message that family members should not blame each other during difficult times, but they should also compromise, respect and accept each other, followed by mutual care and support. The SWD has also put up promotional banners in various districts to relay the message of fostering family harmony by refraining from using inappropriate means to discipline the children and stopping the use of violence among intimate partners. In 2016-17, the SWD launched a short video clip-cum-photo competition for promoting family solidarity on the Internet. Posters were also posted on public transportation systems and in organisations and service units in various districts with a view to reminding the public of the importance of family and encouraging them to strengthen ties among family members. In addition, district-based public education programmes and activities on combating domestic violence have been organised by the district social welfare offices of the SWD. The SWD will continue to promote the messages on combating domestic violence to the public through different means of promotion.

Commencing its work since June 2011, the standing Child Fatality Review Panel has completed the review of the child death cases that occurred in 2012 and 2013, and the review findings have been shared with the public through its third biennial report that was released in August 2017.

The SWD started procuring the service of the 1823 Call Centre in February 2008 to handle enquiries relating to social security matters so that social workers of the SWD Hotline, 2343 2255, can be more readily available to handle calls requiring counselling. Moreover, upon the commencement of service of the NGO-operated Hotline and Outreaching Service Team (HOST) in October 2008, the SWD Hotline started operating on a 24-hour basis with SWD's social workers handling calls during normal office hours, while calls received outside normal office hours are handled by social workers of HOST. HOST also provides outreaching service to specific groups of needy persons in case of emergency warranting immediate intervention by social workers. In 2016-17, 1823 Call Centre handled 46 987 calls, while social workers of SWD Hotline handled 44 402 calls with 1 664 calls requiring counselling service whereas social workers of HOST handled 13 996 calls with 11 889 calls requiring counselling service.

Short-term food assistance service projects run by NGOs started operation in February 2009 to provide short term food assistance to individuals/families. The target service users are those who have proven difficulties coping with daily food expenditure, including those among the unemployed, low-income earners, new arrivals, street sleepers and individuals or families encountering sudden change and facing immediate financial hardship, etc. Enhancement measures have been undertaken on several occasions. In October 2011, the SWD enhanced the service by adding the provision of food and hot meal coupons which can be redeemed at designated food stalls, supermarkets and restaurants. In October 2013, the SWD further enhanced the service by extending the duration of food assistance for each service user from normally a maximum of six weeks to eight weeks and by increasing the allocation per meal-day by 10%. In a new round of invitation for proposals, the two service projects with higher service demand were split into four from March 2014 resulting in an increase of the number of service projects from five to seven for facilitating more effective management and service delivery. In June 2016, the daily meal rate was increased by 10% and the proportion of food value of food/meal coupons was increased from about 40% to 50%. As at 31 March 2017, a total of 248 198 beneficiaries on per-time basis have received food assistance from the service projects.

The three subvented NGOs, each operating an Integrated Services Team for Street Sleepers, provide integrated services including day and late-night outreach visit, emergency shelter/short-term hostel placement, counselling, employment guidance, personal care, emergency fund, aftercare service and service referrals, etc. with an aim to solving the immediate needs of street sleepers, enhancing their work motivation and skills so as to assist them to be self-reliant and reintegrate into the community.

Compassionate Rehousing (CR) is a form of special housing assistance, which aims at providing housing assistance to individuals and families who have genuine and imminent long-term housing needs but, owing to their social and medical needs (if applicable) under specific circumstances, have no other feasible means to solve their housing problems. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, 1 374 and 1 210 cases were recommended by the SWD to the Housing Department for CR respectively.

The SWD administers four charitable trust funds, namely the Tang Shiu Kin and Ho Tim Charitable Fund, the Li Po Chun Charitable Trust Fund, the Brewin Trust Fund and the Kwan Fong Trust Fund for the Needy. The purpose of the funds is to provide one-off and short-term financial assistance to individuals and families facing temporary financial hardship arising from special and emergency situations. In 2015-16 and 2016-17, 1 605 payments (amounted to $6.91 million) and 1 437 payments (amounted to $6.88 million) were made to needy individuals or families respectively.