Today is the Lantern Festival, the fifteenth day of the first month of the Lunar New Year. The Chairperson of the Property Management Services Authority (PMSA), Tony Tse, sends his well wishes through the PMSA blog to all Hong Kong citizens and PM industry practitioners, with the greetings that the epidemic could end soon and everyday life would return to normal. He also earnestly welcomes the Government’s latest round of Anti-Epidemic Fund which allocates $1.82 billion to the Anti-epidemic Support Scheme for the Property Management Sector (ASPM) to recognise and support frontline property management (PM) workers (environmental service and security workers) in combatting COVID-19. The funding proposal was approved by the Finance Committee of the Legislative Council today.
The ASPM will provide financial support to frontline PM workers performing duties related to security or environmental hygiene (i.e. cleaning and security workers) in private residential, composite (i.e. commercial cum residential), industrial and commercial building blocks (including shopping malls). PM companies and owners’ organisations of eligible properties may apply for a subsidy of $2,000 monthly for each frontline PM worker. The subsidy will last for five months (i.e. from February to June 2022) and each eligible building is subject to a quota of 100 headcounts for the subsidy. The Government estimates that about 180,000 frontline PM workers serving around 41,500 eligible building blocks will benefit.
Chairperson TSE said, “Strengthening anti-epidemic work in residential, composite, industrial and commercial buildings is crucial to minimising the risks of virus infection and spreading in the local community. Frontline PM workers serving these properties have been under immense pressure since the onset of the fifth wave of the epidemic. Their workload has been increasing substantially and they are facing high health risk, given their very frequent contacts with residents and visitors during their daily work, and some of them may be working in buildings with residents under “home quarantine”. As the epidemic situation is increasingly severe, financial support to the frontline PM workers is necessary to strengthen their capacity on personal protection and environmental hygiene, as well as to give recognition to their committed anti-epidemic efforts since the onset of the fifth wave of the epidemic.”
The PMSA looks forward to the early implementation of the new round of ASPM so that frontline PM workers can receive the subsidy without delay.
The first round of ASPM implemented in 2020 by the PMSA has granted subsidies of over HK$1.1 billion, benefitting nearly 40,000 building blocks and over 160,000 frontline PM workers.
The PMSA will publish new blog post from time to time to provide the public with information about the PMSA and the industry so that the public can learn more about the work of the PMSA and the operation of the PM profession. To read the full blog post, please visit “How Special in PM”:https://www.pmsa.org.hk/tc/information-centre/blogs/pmsa_20220215/ (Chinese Only).
Ends/Tuesday, 15 February 2022
Issued at HKT 19:00
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