SUSIE MALLETT

My visitors today

Thursday 23 December 2010

It was not a subject touched upon in depth at the Congress...

Lantau Island Country Park

Hong Kong International Airport




I went in the Crystal Car with a glass floor, brilliant.

Yes, it is steep!



Ngong Ping Cable Car
An exciting 5.7 km ride above Tung Chung Bay to Ngong Ping and the Tian Tan Buddha Statue

...but something that hits as all: funding

I arrived back at work to discover that the Conductive Cooking course for young adults that began while I was away, very successfully and with great enthusiasm, is already in danger of closing because of the funding.

Here is a radio report from New Zealand discussing funding cuts there. Cuts that were announced last year and are now being felt:

http://static.radionz.net.nz/assets/audio_item/0006/2448852/ntn-20101221-0908-Government_cuts_to_therapy_for_disabled_children-m048.asx

I am certainly back in the West

The East, that is Hong Kong, appeared to have the funding well and truely sorted.
Perhaps we could have learnt something from a presentation or two about how they do it, or did I miss that while in a different session?



1 comment:

Andrew said...

I do not think that you missed anything. Check the Abstracts. As far as I can see, there were no formal sessions in which such fundamental issues were broached, and certainly no circumstances in which they could be discussed.

Funny that. Perhaps the International Pető Association has no reason to consider such matters of interest or concern. If there is to be further such Congress, perhaps the IPA's menbership (who they?) might consider the question of relevance.

I fear that in the West 2011 will be the Year of the Cuts. There is of course little that CE could do to affect the overal situation but (to act the eternal optimist) perhaps it could still get its act together to affect the priorities of those who cut. Perhaps.

Of course, success in that would mean that somebody else gets the chop. I doubt, though, that CE's competitors for diminishing funding will have any such compunctions of this sort when arguing their case...

Andrew.