People

Hong Kong government will provide HK$50 million to invite public organizations to hold AI training courses for residents. The government will also provide HK$2 billion to improve AI education in primary, secondary schools, and universities, said Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po in the budget plan on Wednesday. “While AI is advancing at a rapid pace, both students and teachers lack a basic understanding of it and the ability to apply it in practice; fewer than one in ten people have a grasp of it,” said Simon Wang, 48, a lecturer at Hong Kong Baptist University computer assisted language learning department. According to data research by Google, of the 4,446 US employees surveyed, only 40% of them have adopted AI in their work, and 5% are AI fluent. In the budget, Chan said public universities will launch 27 undergraduate courses that relate to AI. “HKBU has launched AI and Data Science as a new second major, and the computer science major includes Applied AI as a core course. Computer Science Department holds a supportive attitude to the application of AI in university education,” said Byron Choi Koon Kau, a professor from the Hong Kong Baptist University Computer Science Department. “Most professors still have a low acceptance of AI. Some assignments that could have been completed better with AI are not allowed to be used. It is necessary to fully implement AI training and education,” Wang said. In response to the budget plan for AI training, the Hong Kong Federation of Education Workers said, "We suggest that the government provide more systematic teachers’ AI training programs and add special subsidies to support all teachers in Hong Kong to take AI courses." According to Wen Hui Net, at the beginning of this month, the Education Bureau provided over 70,000 systematic AI training opportunities …

Thousands gathered at the nearby Kwong Fuk Sitting-out Area in Tai Po on Monday to lay flowers in remembrance of the fire victims.  Bouquets, condolence cards and soft toys filled the lawn as citizens paid their respects to the victims of the deadly fire.  Mourners penned blessings and messages on memos, which were posted at a pavilion near Wang Fuk Court.  A similar display of memo wall appeared along a pedestrian tunnel leading to Kwong Fuk Sitting-out Area, but was later voluntarily removed after police cautioned against the practice.

Three years after Chan Sau-mei moved into her flat, the concrete wall started flaking off. Now, 20 years later, the entire building is full of exposed rebars, dust and concrete splatters. “It’s like a sandy beach at home everyday. It is an endless nightmare cleaning up all the mess at my house,” Chan, 52, said, adding that there is a new renovation project nearly every eight months. Chan lives in the Model Housing Estate, Hong Kong’s oldest existing public housing estate, sandwiched between Quarry Bay and North Point on Hong Kong Island. Five of the estate’s six blocks were built in 1954, with one, a redevelopment of the original, built in 1979. Chan’s block is one of the originals built with five to six stories and no lift. Announced in the 2025 Policy Address in September, Lee announced that redevelopment plans for some of Hong Kong's oldest estates will be announced. The Housing Authority is conducting a study on the redevelopment of Model Housing Estate, and will announce its preliminary findings in 2026-27, while redeveloping plans for Ma Tau Wai Estate and Sai Wan Estate by the end of this year. Chan said she is happy to finally hear about redevelopment plans. “I love living here. We have a very close relationship with our neighbours, and doing groceries and commuting around the estate is also convenient. I think this place is a golden location, but the only flaw is it’s old and is worn to a skeleton,” Chan said. With no lift in the five older blocks, Chan said she is lucky to live on the ground floor, as it is very inconvenient to climb five or six storeys every day to their unit, especially for older residents. Even if there are lifts, they sometimes cause inconvenience, said Huang Yang-hong, …

The death toll had risen to 146 from the devastating blaze in Tai Po, police said in a media briefing today. There were 23 bodies initially found at the building that had not yet been removed, said Tsang Shuk-yin, officer in charge from the force’s Casualty Enquiry Unit. The number of injured remains at 79, while 159 residents have been confirmed safe. Tsang said 92 of the deceased and 37 of the injured matched entries on the missing-person list. The police’s Disaster Victim Identification Unit launched operations in Wang Shing House, Wang Kin House and Wang Tai House today and found 18 bodies in stairwells, rooftops and other locations in the three blocks. However, 100 missing-person cases could not be traced, and officers are still attempting to follow up on more than 40 additional reports of people listed as missing. “In some cases, the informants only provided very limited or insufficient information. Some missing persons are confirmed not Wang Fuk Court’s residents, while some informants cannot tell whether missing persons are still residents, as they have not been liaising for a long time,” Tsang said. The overall structural integrity of all Wang Fuk Court’s buildings poses no immediate danger, said Leung Hung-wai, deputy director of the Housing Department. Leung said the second phase of inspection will be launched to extract concrete core samples to evaluate the building structure, once the preliminary inspection on Wang Sun House and Wang Cheong House is completed.