(Borneo Post; May 16, 2009)

KUCHING: Sarawak is set to become the first state in the country to own a welfare service-related portal when the Sarawak Community Care System (SCCS) is fully operational next year.

Apart from Sarawak, the federal government has such a portal to make information on welfare service accessible to the public.

Social Development and Urbanisation Minister Dato Sri William Mawan said the portal would help people in need, particularly in their application for financial aid or other types of assistance.

"Three parts of the system are operational end of this year and the last one, the first quarter of next year. The portal service is timely as we really need this system to re-organise and enhance the state machinery for welfare assistance to the needy," he said when visiting SAINS Training Centre at Jalan Tun Ahmad Zaidi Adruce here when 10 Welfare Department staff are having their training on SCCS.

Permanent Secretary to the Ministry of Social Development and Urabanisation Ik Pahon, Welfare Department Director Kendy Edward and Sarawak Information Systems Sdn Bhd (SAINS) CEO, Teo Tien Hiong were among those present.

Mawan said his ministry sponsored the project because it felt it was desirable to have an integrated welfare management system in the state.

"The purpose of this project is to create a comprehensive tool to facilitate the management of state welfare-related assistance and service as part of the ministry's initiative to improve its service delivery to welfare recipients and the public in general.

The SCCS comprises six main components - Community Care Portal; Assistance Management; Institutions Management Online Application / Case Registration; Disaster Relief Assistance and Social Care Information.

With the portal, the people would soon do away with manual application for welfare assistance, he said.

Besides that, the minister said the public would have access to some useful information and would realise that the department was indeed transparent and keeping to its promises.

"They will be updated with much useful information," he said, adding that the application precesses would be much speedier as people could even submit their applications from home.

"The online system will be fool-proof as well as making it easy for the authorities to detect fraud," he said.

He said the Welfare Department would be linked to the National Registration Department as far as personal details of individuals were concerned.