MyKendiri self-assessment system to ensure smooth, structured operations for care centres, assures minister

KUCHING: The newlylaunched MyKendiri, a selfassessment system for care centre operators, would ensure the smooth and structured operations of such centres, said federal Women, Family and Community Development Minister Datuk Seri Rina Harun.

She said under the system, operators would be responsible to send in reports on their centre’s operations to ensure that they achieved certain minimum standards as per laid out under the Care Centres Act 1993 and Care Centre Regulations 1994.

“MyKendiri will bring benefit not only to the ministry in terms of monitoring, but will also facilitate operators in the running of their centres.

“The previous self-assessment system was manually done, with a lot of questions. So now we are reducing it from 80 questions in eight domains, to 35 questions in four domains and it is all webbased,” she said after launching MyKendiri at Kuching Austistic Association Centre yesterday.

Rina said by ensuring the care centres had been registered and operating under the set terms and conditions, it could reduce the risks associated with unregistered centres.

Noting that it was compulsory for care centres to be registered under the Act, she said the selfassessment would provide the necessary guidelines to ensure the suitability and safety of the centres, among other things.

“When they are registered, monitoring will be done to ensure that they follow terms and conditions.

“We hope that the operators understand that when we impose these terms and conditions, it is not to trouble them but to ease their operations and also to avoid unforeseen circumstances if standards were not to be followed,” she said.

Rina also urged those in the community to report should they come across any unregistered care centres.

“It is the community’s role to inform the Welfare Department in their districts if there are any unregistered centres in their area.”

As at Aug 31, there were 1,861 care centres registered under the Care Centres Act 1993 nationwide.

Earlier, Rina was briefed by Kuching Austistic Association chairperson Dr Catherine Chen on the operations and activities of the centre.

Also present was state Welfare, Community Wellbeing, Women, Family and Childhood Development Minister Dato Sri Fatimah Abdullah.

Rina (second right) and Fatimah (right) in a discussion with Dr Chen (left) at the centre’s garden project. On Dr Chen’s left is Welfare Department deputy director-general (operations) Fatimah Zuraidah Salleh.