The first Voluntary Retirement (VR) Scheme was introduced in July 2000 to enable staff of 59 grades with identified or anticipated staff surplus to retire voluntarily with pension benefits and compensation. About 9 800 applications were approved and all VR takers have been retired from the service under the Scheme.
As one of the measures to achieve the Government's aim to reduce civil service establishment to around 160 000 by 2006-07, the second VR Scheme was launched in March 2003 to enable identified or potential surplus staff in 229 designated grades with specification of ranks/streams therein to leave the service voluntarily so as to reduce the civil service establishment and bring about long-term savings to the Government. About 5 300 applications were approved under the scheme.
