Safeguarding children and families — through the courts, in hospitals, and in the gaps that formal systems do not always reach.
From family reunification and child welfare proceedings to public interest advocacy addressing gaps in the protection of children born to or living with vulnerable parents.
Hong Kong's child protection framework is built on legislation, inter-agency coordination, and professional training. For most families, it functions. But the families the clinic works with — asylum seekers, non-refoulement claimants, undocumented parents, those living in conditions of financial and social precarity — often sit at its edges. The formal protections exist on paper. Whether they are recognised and applied in practice is a different question.
The clinic's work in this area spans direct representation in family and care proceedings, advocacy for family unity in the immigration and non-refoulement context, and public interest work aimed at strengthening the safeguards that protect children born to or living with vulnerable parents. Students work alongside practising lawyers and NGO partners — learning what it means to act in the best interests of a child when those interests are contested, uncertain, or easy for institutions to overlook.
Where cases reveal gaps, the clinic does not stop at the individual outcome. A case that ends well for one family can still point toward changes that protect the next. That transition — from representing a client to engaging constructively with the institutions around them — is one of the things the clinic is designed to teach.
Child protection cases do not fit a single template. The clinic's engagement spans legal representation, welfare advocacy, and constructive engagement with public institutions — often within the same matter.
We support parents and children seeking to remain together or be reunited — across immigration proceedings, non-refoulement claims, and family law. Family unity is a right, not a concession, and its protection often requires active legal intervention when authorities treat it as secondary to immigration control or administrative convenience.
We look at where children's access to welfare, education, and healthcare falls short in practice — particularly for children of asylum seekers and non-refoulement claimants who are formally entitled to services but face practical barriers to accessing them. Identifying the gap between entitlement and reality is the first step toward addressing it.
The clinic works with partner NGOs to identify children at risk of abuse, neglect, or exploitation — including children born to trafficking victims and those living with parents under conditions of acute vulnerability. Early identification, and the appropriate referrals that follow, often matters more than anything a court can later do.
Where casework reveals gaps in institutional protocols — in hospitals, social services, or inter-agency coordination — we engage directly with the bodies responsible for those gaps. This includes formal correspondence with public authorities, research-backed submissions, and constructive dialogue aimed at improving how institutions protect the families they serve.
"The cases inform the research. The research informs the cases. Neither is sufficient on its own."
One matter from this practice area illustrates how the clinic moves from individual representation to direct engagement with institutions when a case reveals something larger than itself. Client details are fully anonymised.
A non-refoulement claimant gave birth at a public hospital. While in hospital, her newborn was taken into the care of an unrelated couple, with a Hospital Authority social worker present. After discharge, when the mother sought to recover her child, she was told by police — on the basis of the social worker's assessment — that the couple had rightful custody. It took intervention by the Hong Kong Dignity Institute, who reframed the situation as a suspected baby trafficking case, for the police to act. Mother and baby were reunited.
Students assessed the case for potential litigation. They concluded, honestly, that the legal obstacles were significant and that pursuing a civil claim would likely not serve the client's interests. They identified greater value in engaging directly with the Hospital Authority: a formal letter to the Hospital Authority asking whether written protocols exist for situations where a newborn may be placed in the care of third parties under circumstances warranting safeguarding scrutiny — and if so, whether they were applied.
The letter was sent by the clinic in March 2026.
The Hospital Authority replied on 20 May 2026. Its response set out, for the first time in writing to the clinic, the multi-disciplinary framework it says governs the discharge of newborns — confirming that the clinic's enquiry had prompted a substantive account of the relevant protocols. The key points of the reply are summarised below.
The reply is significant for the clinic's work in two ways. It places on the record a clear statement that informal third-party handovers are not permitted and that suspected trafficking triggers statutory protection — a standard against which individual cases, including the one that prompted this enquiry, can now be measured. It also demonstrates the value of the clinic's chosen approach: where litigation offered little, a carefully framed institutional enquiry produced a written articulation of the safeguards that should apply.
Child protection work requires close collaboration with frontline organisations whose relationships with vulnerable families go deeper than any legal retainer. Our partners refer cases, provide essential context, and often identify risks before the legal system would.