Dear Minister,

You recently called in the Auditor-General to audit the accounts of Aljunied- Hougang – Punggol East Town Council (AHPETC) because the auditor’s reports raised serious questions about the reliability and accuracy of the town council’s financial and accounting systems. The report raised equally serious concerns over alleged discrepancies in the accounts of the former PAP-run Aljunied Town Council. At issue is the sum of 1.12 million dollars, which the former Aljunied Town Council had recorded as a receivable  due from the Citizens Consultative Committees for improvement projects and whose validity has now been denied by both the Ministry for National Development (MND) and HDB.

I would remind you that the Reform Party, in its budget analysis for 2012 and 2013 and my open letters to you and to Christine Lagarde, has repeatedly raised serious questions abut discrepancies and missing information in the way you present the Budget and the picture therein of the government’s finances.  In particular the Statement of Assets and Liabilities does not match with the total returns that Temasek and GRC claim to have earned since inception and the revenues earned from the sale of land.

We have repeatedly asked you for an explanation for these discrepancies and to supply the missing information. I therefore have great sympathy with my colleagues in the Workers Party who say that they have been unable to get data from government bodies for an item in the accounts run by the former PAP town council.

My experience has also been that lack of transparency and freedom of information makes obtaining critical data an impossibility.

May I remind you that the Auditor-General’s report for the financial year 2011/2012 given to the President and publicly available since July 2012 contained an item under the heading Ministry of Finance, “Presidents concurrence not obtained for promissory note issued.”  

 In short your Ministry had been found to have breached the Constitution and unlawfully granted a loan using taxpayers’ money to the International Development Association, the soft lending arm of the World Bank without obtaining the President’s approval as required under Article 144. The promissory note had to be returned and reissued in order for your Ministry to comply with the law. We were not informed what had happened to the monies the IDA had already drawn down. A junior civil servant was blamed and your ministry promised to put new procedures in place. I would ask you to let our taxpayers know what those new procedures and checks and balances are so that we can have confidence that the controls in your Ministry are sufficiently robust, reliable and accurate.
I believe your recent address to Parliament on 21 January 2014 when introducing a motion for increasing Singapore’s capital contribution to the IBRD (International Bank for Reconstruction and Development) raises further cause for concern over the reliability of your Ministry’s accounting treatments.

In Parliament you describe an accounting treatment for the above IBRD capital contribution which if correct renders  the treatment that you argued in court last year,  applied to Singapore’s loan commitment to the IMF false.  (in Civil Appeal No. 154 of 2012 (Jeyaretnam Kenneth Andrew.)

In court I argued that the IMF loan commitment was a liability and therefore caught by Article 144(1) of the Constitution and you argued at that time, that it was an asset and therefore not caught by 144(1). The judges accepted your version that it was an asset and therefore 144(1) did not apply and I lost my case.

I am writing to you to ask you to explain how you could now give a description in Parliament for a similar scenario, where Singapore is agreeing to provide callable capital to the IBRD on demand, explaining that this represents a liability not an asset.

The two bilateral pledge agreements are in fact very similar structures and therefore you cannot at the same time argue that one is accounted for as an asset and the other as a liability.

If I may refresh your memory the Hansard record for the IBRD motion records you as stating:

“The remaining 94% (of Singapore’s subscription), known as callable capital, will not be drawn by the IBRD except in extreme circumstances, when it cannot meet its obligations on borrowings or guarantees.  To date, the IBRD has never had to call on the callable capital.  It is an AAA-rated institution with a sound balance sheet for over 50 years.  Nevertheless, the full increase in Singapore’s subscription to IBRD’s capital will be charged to the Consolidated Fund, as the callable capital represents an increase in the Government’s financial liabilities. “

I thank you for pointing out to our people that no matter what impeccable history a AAA rated institution has, there can be no categorical case for stating that the callable capital will NOT be in fact called upon. In fact as you will be aware supranational financial institutions, such as the IBRD and the IMF, are awarded their AAA rating and quasi-sovereign status precisely because their member countries, including Singapore, guarantee to bail them out.

I refer you instead to the sentence in italics in which you agree with my previous arguments that a callable capital subscription of this nature represents an increase in the financial liabilities of the Government. In lay terms callable capital is callable- however unlikely- and therefore must be written down in our balance sheets in the Liabilities column not the Assets column.

At the time when it is finally called upon it then swops sides and becomes an asset though you have chosen to write down its value to zero. We are agreed on this – that an actual loan or called upon capital commitment must be listed as an asset. Our subscriptions to the IBRD give Singapore voting rights and allow us to influence policy and thus qualify as assets. I agree that until such time as our commitment is called upon it should be defined as a liability.

This is in fact exactly what I argued in court re the IMF.  You argued the opposite.

Your different explanations on two separate occasions now make you vulnerable to accusations of contradicting yourself or even knowingly misleading the court by presenting two opposing descriptions for the same thing. The only way you can avoid such accusations would be to argue that a loan commitment to the IMF is qualitatively different from a callable capital subscription to the IBRD. However nonsensical that argument would be.
Nonsensical maybe but it does not surprise me that Hansard shows that in the very next sentence you do indeed bravely attempt to defend the indefensible, namely to argue a distinction between the callable capital of the IBRD and that of the IMF. You do this by saying the IBRD subscriptions are ‘unlike’ our loan commitments to the IMF.  It is deeply significant that this reference to the IMF loan commitment is missing from your Ministry’s Press release. And it can only be found by scrutinizing Hansard.  Presumably you would not wish to widely publicize this explanation, not only because it is bunkum but also because it contradicts your previous statements in court and in Parliament.

Let us look at your exact words to Parliament and our people:

“Our subscriptions to the IBRD are hence unlike MAS’ subscriptions to the IMF’s capital, or what is called the “IMF quota subscriptions”, or its loans to the IMF, which are neither expenditures nor liabilities, but assets that remain part of our Official Foreign Reserves.”

In fact Minister you are being economical with the truth and attempting to mislead the people by lumping the commitment to make a loan to the IMF with the loan itself or with an increase in Singapore’s capital subscriptions to the IMF. Here are the three descriptions that you use to describe financial resources provided to the IMF that you run together in the above sentence:

1.”MAS’s subscriptions to the IMF’s capital” is a contingent liability until it is called then it becomes an asset

2. “IMF quota subscriptions” are the same

3. “Loans to the IMF.” Actual loans to the IMF are treated for accounting purposes as assets but so long as the IMF loan commitment remains undrawn it represents a contingent liability for the government, whether when it is drawn it represents a loan or an increase in Singapore’s capital subscription to the IMF.

This can be further demonstrated by examining your answer to a Parliamentary question on 12 May 2012:

“5   These are however temporary resources, provided to the IMF in advance of the expected increase in its permanent capital subscriptions (or quota subscriptions) that will be decided in early 2014.  Participating in the current round of bilateral contributions to the IMF will in effect bring forward part or all of Singapore’s likely share of the increase in the IMF’s capital base in 2014. [my italics]

 6   Singapore’s US$4 billion contingent line of credit to the IMF means that Singapore is expected to lend the funds when the IMF considers necessary.”

Your argument in court that the IMF loan commitment is an asset is furthermore contradicted by MAS’s own accounts for 2012-13. The accounts show our republic’s obligations to the IMF under Commitments, which includes other contingent liabilities such as capital expenditures, leases and a guarantee to Singapore Deposit Insurance Corporation in the amount of $20 billion.

Even you must be aware that a commitment to lend money to the IMF carries risks, however negligible you want the people of Singapore to think these are.

As the Finance Minister and head of the International Financial and Monetary Committee of the IMF, who regularly meets with the US Treasury Secretary, you will know that the US treats commitments to the IMF as contingent liabilities requiring approval by Congress (see here). Furthermore as required under the US Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990 loans made by the US Government are scored to reflect the degree of subsidy or risk of loss. In 2009 the US Congress appropriated US$5 billion to cover the risk of loss on the US commitment to the IMF.

Would you not agree that the government should establish a similar reserve in respect both of our subscriptions (whether called or not) and our loans (whether made or commitments)?

If the IMF loan commitment increases the financial liabilities of the Government  (including within the Government the assets and liabilities of the MAS as defined by Article 142 of the Constitution) then you have clearly breached Article 144(1). This follows from former AG Chan Sek Kheong’s opinion in 1998 that “transactions captured by Article 144(1) are those that, logically, increase the financial liability of the Government.”

 There can therefore be no doubt that our loan commitment to the IMF should have received Parliamentary and Presidential approval. It further follows that by representing a liability as an asset to the Appeal Court you led the Court to rule that it was an asset and to dismiss my appeal.

Whilst you may use sophistry and a constitution re-written by the PAP government to be so vague as to be unfit for purpose and hoodwink our people – it will not pass on a global stage. Already our republic’s banking secrecy laws are bringing us under increasing pressure to comply with global money laundering regulations. We have become known as a haven for dirty money. Our love of accepting ultra rich individuals and large institutions that take advantage of our low tax regime and preferential treatment for non-citizens is also under fire.
As the budget is due to be presented tomorrow, I would hope recent events will persuade you to set out Budget 2014 in an internationally accepted and transparent format as prescribed by IMF and not the deceptive and incomplete format that your Ministry presented in 2013 and in previous years.

Yours faithfully,

Kenneth Jeyaretnam

Secretary General of the Reform Party

*The author blogs at http://sonofadud.com

The Ministry of National Development said that they had already given AHPETC a chance at the end of FY 2011 when their auditors had made a disclaimer of opinion.

However, MND explained that since the situation had not improved, they decided to take action this year.

They reasoned that FY2011 was the WP's first time receiving a disclaimer of opinion and it had promised to improve.

Despite this, MND said that the TC had not fixed the issues that it promised to fix and other issues have also surfaced indicating that the situation had worsened.

Worker's Party explained that they had actually been facing issues trying to get information pertaining to certain financial transactions from the former managing agent and the government authorities and this is why they had been missing financial records.

On the other hand, MND claims that it had given all the requested information to the TC and it was the TC that failed to further details to the MND.

While it seems that both parties are simply pointing fingers at each other, many netizens suspect that this is just another attempt by the authorities to 'fix' the opposition.

It is not until now that the People's Association's 'adverse opinion' on their financial accounts has come into the spotlight, but in fact Workers' Party's Low Thia Khiang raised the issue when it first surfaced in 2008 while he was then MP of Hougang SMC.

He fielded the question in Parliament but got pretty much the same reply that we are getting now:

The adverse opinion was given for a single reason being that the Grassroots Organisations' financial records were not included and this is unimportant given that GROs are self-funded, meaning there is no use of public funds.

Again, the biggest problem with this reply is that it is difficult to verify the claims that GROs are self-funded if they do not have financial records to show this.

Given how closely linked GROs are with PA, it is not unreasonable for the public to assume that they can get funding from PA which is funded by public funds.

Here is the full question and parliamentary reply on the issue from 2008.

Mr Low Thia Khiang:

Madam, the financial statement of the People’s Association ending 31st March 2007 has been qualified with an adverse opinion by the auditor. This was because PA did not provide audited financial information on its more than a thousand grassroots organisations (GROs) in its financial statement. The auditor is unable to assess the financial impact on the financial statement of the PA arising from the non-inclusion of the financial statements of the GROs. These qualifications are in relation to non-compliance with Singapore’s Financial Reporting Standard 24 as well as FRS 27, consolidated and separate financial statements. I understand that this arises from the Ministry of Finance allowing statutory boards to be exempted from certain disclosure requirements of related parties through its minutes or circulars.

Madam, Singapore is proud to have an efficient and transparent public sector. However, such qualified audited report of the PA does not help to enhance the reputation of the public sector. Moreover, PA handles hundreds of millions of dollars of public funds. I would like to ask the Minister:

• What is the rationale for MOF to exempt statutory boards from certain disclosure requirements in FRS 24?
• What has prompted the MOF to issue such an exemption against international standards? Even the private sector listed companies are not exempted from such disclosures of related party transactions.
• How would this impact the transparency of statutory boards, given that many Government functions are now performed by them as agents of the Government?
• Does the Ministry of Finance accept that the financial statement of GROs under the management and supervision of the PA be left outside of PA’s financial statements and, effectively, out of the public’s scrutiny and accountability?

The Minister of State for Finance (Mrs Lim Hwee Hua):

Madam, let me now move on to Mr Low’s cut on the statutory boards. Mr Low Thia Khiang has asked for the reasons for change in disclosure requirements for statutory boards and comments by auditors on the People’s Association’s accounts.

Before November 2007, MOF, through the Accountant-General’s Department, issued finance circulars to prescribe the accounting standards for statutory boards. The key guiding framework used has been the Singapore Financial Reporting Standards, or the SFRS. However, these standards are designed primarily for profit making entities in the private sector. Therefore, the relevance and the appropriateness of each standard to statutory boards has [sic] to be examined first before they can be adopted.

In November 2007, this House passed the Accounting Standards Bill, and the Act came into effect, empowering the Accountant-General to prescribe accounting standards for statutory boards. A committee of independent members with representatives from the Auditor-General’s office, the statutory boards, the academic community and the public accounting firms, has been formed to advise the Accountant-General.

New SFRS and amendments to standards will continue to be examined for their relevance and appropriateness to the statutory boards. As such, there has been no change in the substance of preparation and presentation of accounts by statutory boards. Neither has there been any move to change the disclosure requirements of statutory boards. Our arrangements are similar to the UK where the Treasury prescribes the standard for public sector entities.

As regards PA’s non-consolidation of grassroots organisations’ accounts, the auditor, PriceWaterhouseCoopers, has qualified the financial statements of People’s Association on the basis that the accounts of the grassroots organisations were not consolidated. PA’s view is that the accounts of grassroots organisations should not be consolidated for the following reasons.

Firstly, the funds in these accounts belong to the grassroots organisations. Secondly, the Government grants and the cost of staff support are already accounted for in PA’s financial statements. Thirdly, the grassroots organisations are operationally self-funding through revenues from activities, courses and donations. Fourthly, the grassroots organisations decide on how their money should be spent for the benefit of the residents. And, finally, proper procurement procedures, financial control and good corporate governance practices apply to the grassroots organisations.

I would like to clarify that this adverse opinion pays more emphasis to the FRS27, than to the FRS24, which is the general exemption granted to all statutory boards on account of the onerous work that would otherwise be involved in the disclosure of related party transactions. This is because related party transactions are much more onerous for statutory boards compared to private sector entities due to the wide range of Government related entities. I should also add that other countries have similarly found a need to depart from the FRS24. For example, Australia fully exempts its not-for-profit public entities from such disclosures as well. The Accountant-General’s Department and the Ministry of Finance are discussing this FRS27 issue with PA.

Source: http://sprs.parl.gov.sg/search/topic.jsp?currentTopicID=00002959-WA&curr...

Honouring our PIONEER GENERATION with $8 Billion Fund.

Over the years l witnessed how our community transformed. From drinking water from standpipes to drinking from taps, from attap and zinc homes to HDB flats, from street hawkers to hawker centres and food courts, from one Outram General Hospital (now SGH) to 5 huge Hospitals, from big families of 8 and more, to smaller families of 3 to 4.

Life was simple then, and with no TV, owning a radio was a luxury. Resettlement was common, so many were asked to move from one place to another to make way for roads, new homes, schools and new industries. Many had their land acquired for comprehensive development. They were paid very little. Life was quite disruptive as big families were broken up to move into smaller HDB flats during resettlement exercises. Many grumbled but there was no choice as Singapore was in the construction phase of nation building.

Education was encouraged and schools were built to meet demand. Many families did not send the girls to school. So it was not uncommon to find the elder girls leaving school to help look after the family. Now they need help.

Jobs were not easy to find and hawking on the streets were a common sight. Pirate taxis ply the road and they were cheap form of transport. The streets were not generally safe and gangsters roamed the streets till LKY threw them into jail. The people were generally poor but they went about trying to make ends meet.

When they fell ill they visit the Outpatient Dispensary (OPD) which gave good and affordable medical care. For mothers and children there would be Maternal and Childcare clinics to take care of them. Home deliveries of babies were common. 

Today Singapore has transformed into a first world city. The change was too fast for many. So this pioneer generation now faces a new challenge. Their simple lifestyle cannot meet the demands of the new world. With little education they accepted not high paying jobs. They do not have much in their CPF and many have no CPF. They toiled very hard so their children would have a better life. 
Now age has caught up with them. Today many are struck down with multiple health problems. They used to pay less than $5 dollars for an OPD visit but now it is different. Health bills have jumped many folds. Also some were resettled away from their children so they stay alone.

I hope with this backdrop younger Singaporeans will have a better appreciation of what the pioneer generation went through.

This move to help this generation is timely and I support this very fine gesture.

Dr Tan Cheng Bock

*Article first appeared on his FB page here.

Much have been said about funding to schools since the Straits Times reported about funding cuts for top independent schools last week. It turned out that the report had inaccuracies that MOE corrected, with more reports subsequently published in the Straits Times, in TODAY, onChannelNewsAsia and elsewhere. Nevertheless, MOE has a new funding formula of which details are not known to the public, but it will result in some funding cuts to 4 of the top schools.

Criticisms of MOE’s move include that by Dr Koh Poh Koon, grassroots advisor and PAP’s chairman-designate for Punggol East, who said that ‘telling schools to cut down on air-conditioned classrooms is akin to “removing air-conditioning in A-class (hospital) wards to keep the C-class patients less envious”‘.

I thought that was an inaccurate illustration to use because A-class patients pay a lot more than C-class patients. No one in Singapore really bothers about kids in international schools receiving top-end facilities because their parents paid for them. The funding adjustments are to public schools which are heavily paid for by taxpayers. Entry to public secondary schools and colleges is still mainly based on what the child has achieved academically and to some extent in co-curricula activities, regardless of social status. One cannot supposedly pay their way into a top public school. So the comparison cannot be about Class-A and Class-C wards.

Dr Koh had also said: “Instead of making it comfortable for all students, we have decided to make it equally uncomfortable for everyone… We must not be tempted to ensure equality in society by pulling down those at the top.” and that if the intent was about “making it a so-called level playing field, then it’s really creating equal misery.”

My concern in reading such statements is that they convey to readers that neighbourhood schools in Singapore with poorer resources are uncomfortable and miserable. They also create a sense of envy by those in neighbourhood schools of other educational institutions with better resources.

Two years ago, JC student Kwek Jian Qiang created a storm when he wrote to the forum pages of TODAY implying that the best school facilities must be reserved for those with the best academic results, because they had worked hard to get there. He bemoaned the poor facilities in junior colleges compared to the Institute of Technical Education campuses. I had written to share my concerns about such ways of thinking. My concerns then still apply to this funding debate, that (1) academically good students will feel they deserve and will demand the best facilities; (2) students become jealous if the facilities in their schools are worse that in another school, creating an endless cycle of envy; (3)  our youths become over-reliant on having good physical facilities that they lose the ability to improvise and overcome shortages in resources when we are faced with such situations.

(For the records, Kwek Jian Qiang made a quick online apology. I subsequently met him and was glad he has put the episode behind and is now active in serving the community.)

I like to support MOE’s broad direction to make resources more equitable across schools, except that there are not much details put out on what the new funding formula is and how it will improve resources in neighbourhood schools. More than just physical resources, what I feel is important is how learning programmes in neighbourhood schools can improve. Years of PRIME upgrading have already put our public schools’ infrastructure way above that of many other countries.

Improvement can come in many other ways, such as smaller class sizes which Gifted Education children now enjoy. It can also be in the way teachers are deployed to schools. Independent schools have a lot of autonomy in the selection of teachers which other schools do not have. I like to see the discussion moving on to how we can resource neighbourhood schools to improve the learning experience rather than about physical infrastructure.

Yee Jenn Jong

Non-constituency Member of Parliament

Source: Yee Jenn Jong’s blog

Nominated Member of Parliament, Eugene Tan explained that the budget is a tool to set the direction of Singapore not just financially, but also economically, politically and socially.

He commented that the budget this year is more popular and it tends more to our "growing social needs".

While the position has shifted slightly towards more welfare, the underlying themes are still the same as previous years with productivity and reducing the reliance on foreign labour being key focuses.

He pointed at that this year, there is more appreciation being shown with the Pioneer Generation Package and there has been a shift to the left with the government showing its ability to give more.

This year, more middle income earners will be included in some of the schemes previously only for low-income earners as the government acknowledges the rising pressures that the middle class is experiencing.

While Singapore has always taken a more prudent approach to social spending, Ms Tan observed that the shifts we are seeing now are good, particularly as there has been a lack of social spending in the past.

However, the government also emphasised that there is 'collective' responsibility and that we should not become a society which is dependent on welfare.

Ms Tan commented that the Budget could have done more to give direct benefits to average Singaporeans in order to reduce the class gap. He suggested that the budget could be used to shape the mindset that the well-off Singaporeans must help those who are less well-off.

He said that in general, the budget has shaped 'social investment' where social spending is not an expenditure and instead is an investment into stability for future growth.

Speaking at a post-budget dialogue session, Khaw Boon Wan said today that the CPF contribution rates mean that Singaporeans already have more than enough savings to cover their housing needs.

He explained that the additional 1% requirement being added in this year’s budget is to address healthcare needs, indicating that no more needs to be done to meet housing needs. He was responding to some questions about why the additional 1% couldn’t be used for housing.

Talking a bit more on the affordability of housing, Khaw Boon Wan blamed Singaporeans saying that housing is only unaffordable if people try to buy a bigger flat than what they need.

Clearly, Khaw Boon Wan is not aware of the struggles of people who do not have enough CPF savings to buy flats that they really need.

For some, especially those who may have been out of a job for quite some time, they are not likely to have enough CPF savings to make their housing payments.

Singapore has no safety net such as benefits for the unemployed and the influx of foreigners has made it difficult for some retrenched workers to get back into full-time work. When stuck in this situation, CPF savings may not be enough to make the payments for the HDB loans they have taken out.

Even those who buy flats that were within their means originally, may face difficulties especially when they lose their jobs.

Speaking about other schemes the MND is putting into place separate from the budget, Khaw said that they are looking to expand the lease buy-back scheme to allow more Singaporeans, especially seniors, to monetize their flats more easily by selling off some years of the lease.

Khaw said that the details are still being worked out but he indicated that the scheme may soon be expanded to be available for 4 and 5 room flat owners.

Other tweaks to housing policies that may be seen in the future include making it easier for second-time home buyers to secure a flat. 

At another post-budget dialogue session held in Fuchun Community Centre yesterday, Khaw Boon Wan responded to grassroots leaders’ questions that the Budget this year is already very generous “by any measure”.

He had been asked whether more could have been done for various groups such as parents and NS men to which he responded that in every situation more could be done but it is still important to be prudent.

He said that Singapore is in a very good position and the people should reflect more on what they have.

For example, he said that Singapore consistently has a budget surplus and this allows for the government to give out additional benefits. He compared this to the situation in America and Japan where the government is cutting down a lot of public spending to address its severe budget deficits.

Other questions raised at the dialogue included why the extra 1% CPF contribution had to go into Medisave and couldn’t be used for housing.

To this, he explained that there is already enough CPF for housing as affordability is “not an issue” and we needed to concentrate on healthcare costs.

(See full story here: Khaw Boon Wan: CPF is ‘more than enough’ for housing)

Khaw also said that dialogue sessions about the benefits of the budget should be held in dialects at the grassroots level so that all Singaporeans can learn of the various new schemes and benefits.

He also explained that neighbours have a role to play in spreading the message.

Overall, he said that the response to the budget has been largely positive.

Related: Khaw Boon Wan: Healthcare is affordable!

Talking about the new measures to help SMEs announced in this year’s budget, MP for Nee Soon GRC Lee bee Wah said that the government knows the challenges that SMEs face.

She said that the extension of schemes such as the Productivity and Innovation Credit Scheme will help to reduce the burden of investing into productivity boosting technology for SMEs.

This can in turn help them cope with the tightening labour market.

She summarized the budget as a “group-up” budget pointing out that a lot of help is being given out to various groups on the ground in response to different concerns raised n parliament and through grassroots.

Lee Bee Wah is in the government’s workgroup focused on helping SMEs cope with restructuring and the changing labour market.

She praised the budget’s efforts to give more to SMEs. 

When the pioneer generation package was first leaked to the press, it was reserved only for those who were 65 years and older at the time of the budget. This would apply to people born in 1948 and earlier, and exclude those born in 1949.

I wrote in Facebook that the first batch of NS men called up for full time military service was those born in 1949. They would be excluded under the original scheme.

I know of this fact, because I was born in 1948 and missed this “privilege”. I wrote that it was an irony that the cutoff date would exclude the people the people who had to serve full time NS.

Someone probably read my comment and perhaps pass the message to the Cabinet. They probably decided to extend the package by one more year, to include the first batch of NS men.

What about the second and subsequent batches? This is the flaw of giving benefits based on a cutoff date. Some people get a lot of benefit, others get $0. This is a divisive policy.

It is better to give the benefit to everyone who has reached 65 years of age, now and in the future.

Tan Kin Lian

* Kin Lian retired from NTUC Income on 28 February 2007, after heading this cooperative for 30 years. He was a Presidential candidate in the 2011 Presidential Election. He now runs a consultancy company. He blogs at www.tankinlian.com to give his views on insurance, investment and financial planning for the benefit of consumers.

SPP’s response to Budget 2014 

"Solving the issues Singaporeans are now grappling with – finding jobs, dealing with the high cost of living, overcrowding – boil down to one thing, economic transformation. Budget 2014 does not address this elephant in the room – how does Singapore transform itself economically and socially in order to survive the next 50 years? The Finance Minister assumes that some economic sectors can transform themselves effectively, away from an over-reliance on cheap labour. This does not seem to be the case." - SPP Asst Secretary-General Loke Hoe Yeong 

The 2014 Budget remains much like last year’s, with more generous topping up of perks. Nonetheless the Singapore People’s Party (SPP) is encouraged to hear about the Pioneer Generation Package. The hard work of the older generations in building up modern Singapore is finally being recognised. This recognition is long overdue. The SPP looks forward to the details that the government is expected to unveil later.

Going beyond GST vouchers

There is nothing new with the GST vouchers – we have them almost every year. While this is a good initiative, the SPP feels that at this point in the evolution of the socio-economic needs of Singaporeans, the government must take a step to go beyond subsidies and small-scale redistribution of money. 

Instead the SPP feels that it is the government’s accountability to its people must be based on the following indicators: 

·      the percentage of Singaporeans employed in newly created jobs;

·      the median pay of Singaporeans versus our foreign counterparts;

·      what incentives are in place to motivate companies to help meet the indicators above.

Going beyond acronyms 

Every year, the government introduces many new initiatives that are accompanied by a slew of acronyms. This year, there is “iSPRINT”, “IPG” and many more interesting names. Besides them being easy to remember, these names need to go beyond that. We need to look closely and examine the follow-through of these initiatives. We need to know if they have been successful or not in terms of what they set our to achieve. We cannot coin new acronyms annually on to be forgotten in the end. 

For example, a few months ago, it was announced that more than $400 million was to be set aside for the Future of Manufacturing initiative. The SPP would like to know what is the outcome of such exciting initiatives rather than to see new initiatives being introduced. 

Singapore vs the world: how advanced are we actually? 

The Finance Minister raised the example of the success of the online tailoring company, Marcella. We applaud Marcella’s successful business model. But in reality, online tailoring businesses, and other interesting retail ideas, are not new and unique to Singapore. Many countries with an even more innovative and competitive retail sector have already developed such business ideas at least 5 to 7 years ago.[1]

What we like to stress is that Singapore needs more substantial and substantive innovation breakthroughs to eventually match the capabilities in other advanced economies. We may even have to take the hard decision to change our mindsets and restructure our economy to become more robust and dynamic to compete in today’s world. 

This brings us to the idea of how we need to urgently address the concerns and worries of Singaporeans today. 

Our vision: Look further ahead to meet Singaporeans’ needs today

Solving the issues Singaporeans are now grappling with – finding jobs, dealing with the high cost of living, overcrowding – boil down to one thing, economic transformation. 

Budget 2014 does not address this elephant in the room – how does Singapore transform itself economically and socially in order to survive the next 50 years? The Finance Minister assumes that some economic sectors can transform themselves effectively, away from an over-reliance on cheap labour. This does not seem to be the case.

Our suggestion would be for Singapore to encourage more productive, innovative and cutting edge foreign companies to come in to collaborate and encourage local companies to build up our productivity through competition. There will then be limited growth for companies that are overly reliant on low wage foreign labour. We have a few of these companies in the marine industry, for instance. 

To dream of a Singapore that will last beyond the next 50 years, we need to build on what we always had – our human capital. We need to continue to invest in our people and educate them for the future. Our education system has to be robust and dynamic to meet the challenges ahead.  

The SPP’s Policy Group will continue to look at the Budget, especially the rolling out of the Pioneer Generation Package. Our NCMP Mrs Lina Chiam will be making our fuller response to Budget 2014 in Parliament next week, and after the details of the Budget are explained further during the Committee of Supply debate. 

[1] One such example is Cad and the Dandy, a UK based online tailoring company. The other is Shoes of Prey, an online shoe company that customises the designs of your shoes.

LOKE HOE YEONG
Asst Secretary-General,
Singapore People’s Party (SPP)

I believe the current PAP gov has lost the plot totally. Its heart to serve the people have long been overridden by pure greed. At every election, they resorted to chicanery to stay in power by gerrymandering. I keep finding for rational reasons on why our defence budget overshadow our health spending by a mile.

Let me attempt to show why i think this PAP government has lost its moral compass and political credibility.

While i understand that national security is important, it surely cannot be more important than its people's well being.

The poor skips medical treatment due to high medical cost but our defence budget keeps on increasing year-in year-out.

A few questions we need to ask ourselves;

1) Are we in a volatile region where war can break out any moment like the middle east?

2) Is Singapore facing civil unrest like Thailand, Myanmar etc?

3) Is Singapore facing turbulent protest every other month that our army needs to be deployed every now and then?

4) Is Singapore facing the threat of annihilation from other hostile countries?

5) Are we involve in live combat in places like Afghanistan and Iraq to justify the increase in defence spending?

6) Are we anticipating any country to attack us and threaten our sovereignty?

7) Do we really need to purchase all those subs, state of the art military firepower that money can buy?

8) Do we have to conscript our boys a full 2 yrs of national service?

What we need at this moment to name a few;

1) More budget allocated to healthcare spending

2) More hospitals to assuage the recent bed crunch

3) Universal health insurance scheme where every citizen is covered

4) An increase in public assistance monies for the elderly

5) Affordable flats for the homeless

6) Wipe out poverty in Singapore. Yes it can be done with heavy gov intervention rather than heavy defence spending

7) Swiss standard of living

So tell me, are we not taken in for a ride by these ppl whom we chose to rule over us? While they are quick to recognize their own contributions, they are oblivious to the peoples' sacrifices towards nation building by continuously dismissing and withholding our rights to the spoils and wealth of the country.

Osman Sulaiman

*Comment first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/osman.bin.sulaiman/posts/10152122052342550

TOWARDS A MORE GRACIOUS SOCIETY

KEY COMMENTS AND PROPOSALS

• Since the year 2002, NSP has made repeated calls on the Government to do more for our elderly.

• Budget 2014 only reinforces the transactional value in our society. We have missed the opportunity to lay the foundation for a more gracious one.

• PGP is premised on rewarding a generation of people who had sacrificed much towards the economic success of Singapore. It is not centered on taking care of our senior citizens regardless of their contribution.

• A kind and gracious society takes care of its elderly because they are our elderly, regardless what they had given when they were younger.

• NSP welcomes Budget 2014's initiative to alleviate some of the concerns of our older citizens, especially their concerns of affordability of healthcare, through the PGP.

• T here is precedence that the Government's previous Budget estimates have seen significant upward revisions, so, Budget 2014 could have considered other measures to ensure better peace of mind for our senior citizens.

• NSP proposes that the Government considers an inflation-indexed social pension scheme for the benefit of our senior citizens.

• NSP proposes that the FDW levy be waived for elderly Singaporeans wishing to hire foreign domestic workers to support them to age in place.

• NSP proposes that Singapore's bed per 1000 total population be raised to at least 3.0 per 1000 total population.

• NSP proposes for more Government Polyclinics to be built and also that the operating hours of the Government Polyclinics be extended.

• NSP proposes that CHAS scheme be further enhanced.

• NSP proposes an increase in the headcount of doctors and nurses to the levels of the high-income, first-world countries.

• NSP proposes that pre-primary education be nationalised and to make kindergarten education compulsory for all.

• NSP proposes that the tuition fees of local tertiary education institutions be 50% subsidised for Singaporean second children and be fully subsidised for Singaporean third and subsequent children.

• NSP proposes that Government further enhance its initiative to tap on private bus operators.

• NSP proposes that the Government further simplify the criteria for such schemes and grants targeted to improve productivity, and remove any red tapes to allow for claims to be processed faster so that businesses will not have a strain on their cash flow.

• NSP supports efforts to study the feasibility of creating a national database tracking industrial and retail rents. Such an effort will not only enhance transparency, but may also have a moderating effect on the rising rental costs.

• NSP urges Government to consider our proposals in previous Party's previous Budget responses which will benefit Singapore and Singaporeans if implemented. These include, a call to cut GST to 5.5%;  a review of the Certificate Of Entitlement System; to raise top marginal personal income tax rate to 22% for those earning above $500,000; to re-instate Estate Duty at 5% for total assets (without differentiating between residential properties or other assets) between $10m to $15m, and 10% for amounts above that; and to raise the casino tax rates to 22.5% for non-premium players and 7.5% for premium players.

• NSP calls on the Government to affirmatively promote and support the growth of civil societies, non-government organisations and other cause-based, Singapore-registered associations, by offering them the use of office space at designated locations at free or subsidised rents.

NSP

For the Full Response, please click here.

Jaslyn Go | YourSDP.org

The SDP was invited to Sweden's Folkpartiet Liberalerna (Liberal People's Party) party conference in November last year and I had the privilege of attending it with our party Vice-Chairman John Tan.

I met Dr Carl Hamilton, an economics professor and senior Folkpartiet official, and entered into a discussion with him about the population situation in Sweden and Singapore. He related to me that his country had a very supportive childcare system which the people, especially women, depended on because they had to work. He said that the system was very successful and seemed genuinely proud of it.

Indeed, Sweden's childcare system is very comprehensive. The most important factor is that the childcare schools were affordable: Parents paid about $130 per month for full-time care for the first child with the rates reduced with subsequent children. The main bulk of the expenses are picked up by the government. (Apparently, Sweden's national budget for pre-school childcare is more than for its defence.)

More than 80 percent of children between the ages of one and five spend part of their weekdays in childcare schools which emphasises the importance of play in a child’s development and learning, not 1-2-3s and A-B-Cs. The curriculum is tailored to the interests and needs of the children are key components of their education in the pre-school curriculum with the aim of providing equal opportunities in life.

The system is widely admired throughout the world. The pre-school childcare system feeds into the formal school system. The most striking aspect is that Swedish children are not put through the grind of tuition like in Singapore.

The system doesn't only take care of the children's development, it also allows the people to feel secure enough to produce enough babies to replace themselves. According to World Bank's figures, Sweden's births per woman in 2011 was 1.9 whereas Singapore's is only 1.2.

Given the population and immigration situation we have at the moment, this seems a legitimate issue to be discussing. Wouldn't it make sense to provide parents with better and more affordable childcare facilitates so that couples don't have to fear the cost of raising children in an expensive city like Singapore?

As a mother, I know how important affordable childcare is as we try to juggle and struggle between taking care of our children and trying to make a success out of our careers. Many Singaporean women are torn between one or the other.

In Sweden, however, because of a generous parental leave scheme, more than 70 percent of women are employed -- the highest rate in the EU. But this is not done at the expense of the children, unlike in Singapore when a recent report said that 95 percent of Singaporean parents regretted spending too much time at work and not enough at home with their children.

In order to help Swedes strike a healthy work-life balance, the state allows women to use flexible working arrangements. Swedish parents can take parental leave to spend time with their children. Both mum and dad are, together, entitled to up to 16 months paid leave (up to 80 percent of one's salary) per child. 

Such a system has an added advantage: Unlike us, Swedes do not depend on domestic helpers, who are untrained child caregivers and teachers, to help raise their children. Young children in Sweden are socialised and educated by trained professionals and this will translate into important consequences in later stages of development. 

The Swedish model is designed to make the family the centre of societal life. It supports parents as they bring up their children and ensures that children grow up to be well-adjusted people who lead healthy, fulfilling lives instead of slogging away with tuition. That's what a good quality of life is.

Jaslyn Go is SDP's Assistant Treasurer and Head of the Fund Raising Unit. 

Source: YourSDP.org

Minister Khaw Boon Wan has called Budget 2014 “very generous …by any measure” so naturally, I want to see how it holds up by my measure but because the budget contains information black holes and inexplicable discrepancies measuring it is almost impossible.  This leads me to believe that Minister Khaw Boon Wan is singing a tune without the benefit of the sheet music. No wonder his song strikes a discord with the ordinary citizen.

First let’s remind ourselves of Budget 2013 which I analysed in an article entitled “How To Make A Surplus Disappear without Anyone Noticing”.  This is what I said:

“There is an accepted format for the layout of budgets prescribed by the IMF. Last year I asked why the Budget could not be set out in the format prescribed by the IMF. In July 2012 I wrote an open letter to Christine Lagarde (see here) asking this question in more detail and that latter was published by the Huffington Post.  I said there that :

 The foreword to the IMF manual sets out an analytical framework for budgets and states that one of the aims of the framework is to provide an early warning system as to when things start to go wrong.”

 And also:

“Specifically lacking in  Budget 2013 are the figures for  net interest earned and investment gains or losses on financial assets and liabilities. It also does not include a value for the state’s land holdings or for receipts from land sales.

The only information available to us is the Statement of Assets and Liabilities [of Singapore which the Finance Minister is required to publish every year]that is more than a year out of date. This barely helps us gain some picture of the true state of the government’s financial position and the size of our net assets particularly as it comes without any explanatory footnotes or an explanation as to what accounting policy is followed.

 As the stocks of financial assets and liabilities are more than twelve times the flows represented by revenues and expenditures any losses in the former can easily dwarf any surpluses in the latter.  We see no reason not to have full transparency, as secrecy can only be conducive to lack of accountability, even to mismanagement and potential corruption.”

I have read through this year’s Budget Speech and my first thought was, Yipee!  I don’t have to do any work I can republish the piece I wrote last year.  Seriously, nothing has changed and that is not a good thing. The Budget presentation continues to be a joke, using a format that does not follow the guidelines prescribed by the IMF described in the Government Financial Statistics Manual 2001.

I wonder why our Finance Minister was appointed head of a key committee of the IMF when he does not even follow IMF procedure.  Presumably this has got something to do with the speed and willingness with which the PAP committed to giving away $5 billion of our money (more than 60% of the money promised to our Pioneer Generation!) without bothering with democratic niceties like Presidential or Parliamentary approval.

Christine Lagarde, the head of the IMF, must be pleased with the way our courts have moved so swiftly and efficiently to prevent us from challenging the legality of the government’s actions by saying we do not havelocus standi.

I have been pointing out the lack of transparency and the use of smoke and mirrors in the government’s accounts since the Reform Party’s critique of Budget 2012, which was repeated with Budget 2013. I also wrote open letters to the Finance Minister asking him why the Budget was not presented in the format prescribed by the IMF. I have also written an open letter to Christine Lagarde about the discrepancies in the government’s accounts and their failure to provide a full picture of the government’s finances. In particular I highlighted the failure to provide figures for net investment income, capital receipts and revenue from land sales. This was republished in Huffington Post.

In “Where have all our reserves gone?”, “Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Missing Reserves” and “An Unappetizing Picture”,  published in September 2012, I highlighted the fact that the then Statement of Assets and Liabilities (SAL)  rang further alarm bells as forensic analysis suggested that the returns achieved by GIC would have had to have been much lower than the quoted returns in order to reconcile the stated figure for total net assets with Temasek’s assets and estimated revenues from land sales:

“It is only by reducing the rate of return on assets to 5.2% that one gets to a theoretical total assets level of roughly $720 billion which is close to the figure for total assets shown in the government’s SAL…

However, when one adds in Temasek’s assets and the likely revenue from land sales, returns appear to have been much worse. I calculated what would be the theoretical rate of return on assets to equal the total assets shown in the government’s balance sheet at 31 March 2011 minus Temasek assets of $180 billion and estimated revenues from land sales of $100 billion. It is only when the return on assets is reduced to a shocking 2.5% in S$ terms while keeping the rate the government pays on its debt to CPF holders at 3.5% that we are able to reconcile our theoretical calculations with what is shown in the government’s balance sheet.”

 This was of course a theoretical exercise and, in the absence of any light from the Finance Minister on this black hole, the real picture could be better than laid out above or conceivably much worse. We have no way of knowing. I have not had a chance to bring my analysis up to date with this year’s SAL but I am confident my conclusions there would be unaltered.

Even if the government is barred from spending past reserves without Presidential approval, which in any case can be overridden by a two-thirds vote of Parliament, surely Parliament and the people are entitled to know the true reserve position and how well the government has performed that year in managing them. Nations like Norway, which also have substantial Sovereign Wealth funds, have adopted full transparency and present the results to their Parliament each year.  We should be doing this.

This year the Finance Minister has become even braver in his determination to mislead Singaporeans as to the true state of the government’s finances. Perhaps he is emboldened by his victory in court allowing the PAP to proceed unchecked.  Particularly as the Opposition in Parliament are unlikely to ask any tough questions and will certainly vote for the Budget.

So let’s look at how he misleads us this time over the disturbing question of our abnormally large surplus. The difference between the estimated surplus for 2013 of $2.4 billion, according to the PAP’s format, and the revised surplus for 2013 of nearly $4 billion announced in Budget 2014 is already embarrassingly large. That figure pales into insignificance when compared with a likely government surplus of nearly $30 billion (extrapolated from the six months’ figures shown in the Monthly Digest of Statistics for January 2014. ) And the government surplus is likely to be considerably narrower than the general government surplus, which includes the results of Temasek and other GLCs and statutory boards not under the GIC and MAS umbrella.

However I cannot say for certain what the figures are as the government has started to make it more difficult to find out what the true surplus is.  This may be because many other commentators are now starting to follow my lead, albeit somewhat timidly, and point out that the surplus is vastly larger than the Finance Minister would have us believe.

The problem is that the Yearbook of Statistics used to contain details of the general government surplus in addition to the government surplus but now the format has been changed so it merely presents the surplus in the format the Finance Minister uses, which as we know not only contains no useful information but is deliberately misleading.  The Statistics Department has even started restricting online access to anything but the current issue of the Monthly Digest of Statistics (MDS), which only has six months worth of data on last year’s government surplus. Back issues have disappeared. Fortunately the Finance Minister is still obliged under the Constitution to publish the annual Statement of Assets and Liabilities, though this is completely opaque asit is unaccompanied by any explanatory footnotes and is in any case a year out of date. What first world country swims against the global tide towards more openness and transparency by going backwards and trying to restrict its citizens’ access to information?

In Budget 2013 the Finance Minister used his usual trick of transferring the entire Net Investment Returns Contribution (which is meant to provide resources for current spending) straight back to the reserves by allocating most of it to Top-ups to Endowments and Trust Funds (which do not represent current spending). I wrote about this accounting trick  previously in Smoke and Mirrors in the Government’s Accounts. This is what I said then:

• The setting up of funds  appears to be a way of bringing the Overall Budget Balance close to zero and mirroring almost exactly the Net Investment Returns Contribution. $7 billion  set aside for new funds in 2012 and $7 billion in net investment returns contributions.  This is despite the fact that monies appropriated to these funds may not be spent for many years, if at all. Again this deviates from the IMF framework, which would require that these appropriations show up as part of net acquisition of financial assets. ( see  http://thereformparty.net/about/press-releases/budget-2012-part-one/ and http://sonofadud.com/2012/06/14/chesapeake-energy-and-temasek-a-tale-of-... for details of how our accounts fail to follow IMF accepted procedure)
• The $41 billion in the funds’ assets is a sum of money conveniently removed from the direct control of Parliament. In other words the Finance Minister  has unfettered control over their budgets and disbursements.
• The legislation requires that these funds produce annual reports and accounts that the Finance Minister is supposed to submit to Parliament. However a preliminary inspection of Hansard uncovered no evidence that this had ever happened. [I later discovered that while some of the funds have been audited by the Auditor-General others, such as the National Productivity Fund and the Bus Services Enhancement Fund, do not even appear in the SAL. More on this soon]
• These funds appear to be a way of injecting capital into the statutory corporations (mainly Temasek, GIC and MAS) almost exactly mirroring the outflow from the Net Investment Returns Contributions (NIRCs). However I have not been able to discover any information as to how these funds are invested. In the Statement of Assets and Liabilities their assets are pooled with the rest of the government’s assets.  If it is indeed the case that these monies have ended up being invested in Temasek or GIC then this would seem to violate Article 7(A) of the Financial Procedures Act.
• Finally and most seriously, if these funds are invested in Temasek or GIC, then they may be being used as a way of alleviating the stress these funds are under as a result of poor performance. In particular they ensure that cash outflow is minimal which might otherwise put pressure on the funds to sell some of their investments. If these are illiquid then there could be a considerable drop in their price. While I would hesitate before saying that there is any mismarking or overvaluation of assets we do know from the government’s own balance sheet that the performance of the sovereign wealth funds appears to have been extremely poor.

In this year’s Budget the Finance Minister pulls off the same feat by using this years NIRC to fund the whole of the Pioneer Generation Package of $8 billion. In actuality annual spending, on the Finance Minister’s own figures, is likely to only be around $400 million. If history is any guide, the PAP government will, through its customary stinginess as exhibited in the way the surplus invariably turns out to be higher than expected, likely considerably underspend the amount budgeted.

I will return shortly to discuss the other aspects of the Budget, which pale into insignificance beside the signal fact of how badly Singaporeans are being short-changed by this PAP government. I cannot understand the gushing praise that seems to have come in from many pundits and commentators from civil society and elsewhere.

If we look at the Statement of Assets and Liabilities and the MDS, government net assets have grown by some $100 billion over the three years 2010-2013.  Why is that level of continued accumulation of assets necessary and why is the Finance Minister making such efforts to hide the true fiscal situation from the people, even by resorting to subterfuges that would not be permitted if Singapore’s accounts had to be audited like a corporation’s? After all the PAP often pride themselves on claiming to manage Singapore like a corporation. Yet if Singapore were Apple, for example, corporate activists would be demanding the return of a sizable portion of its cash pile to shareholders in the absence of compelling reasons from the management for keeping it. Singaporeans should be demanding answers and, if none are forthcoming, voting to change this country’s management.

Singaporeans have lived too long in completely unnecessary austerity. To cite just one example, while your government has quietly accumulated another $100 billion, you have been forced to wait in tents for medical treatment at government hospitals. These are service standards that would shame a third world country and in any advanced democracy would lead to the government being voted out. There is no justification for such penny-pinching when the stock of the government’s financial assets keeps growing. It is time we awakened to our rights as citizen shareholders and force the PAP government to either return part or all of the surplus to us or else make the case as to why they should be allowed to keep it. Are the returns they can achieve from holding on to our money so much better than we can achieve by entrusting it to private managers or investing it ourselves?  Does the PAP need the money to invest in some new invention that will miraculously transform our lives? I doubt it.

 Finally you may by now be able to guess my answer to Khaw Boon Wan’s contention that this is a very generous Budget. My answer is that this Budget is not only not generous, it is quite breathtaking in the audacity with which it attempts to fool Singaporeans. Singaporeans, it is your money. You may think you are  a free people but so long as you work to provide cash for a government which feels no pressure to live up to basic standards of accountability and transparency then you are actually enslaved.

Kenneth Jeyaretnam

*As a blogger, KJ hopes to help imagine a model for a New Asian Nation to bring about a free and fair future for Singapore. KJ is a Cambridge-trained economist who could be broadly described as from the Keynesian school. He is also a successful ex-hedge fund manager and a liberal opposition politician who contested in the 2011 General Election with the Reform Party. He is currently its Secretary-General. He blogs at sonofadud.com.

The SDP welcomes the Government’s plan to provide financial assistance to the elderly through the Pioneer Generation Package (PGP). It is important that as our people age, we accept the responsibility of taking care of them as they have contributed to this nation when they were younger.

It must be recognised, however, that the PGP is an ad hoc measure to address the difficulties of the elderly. The Package raises an important, and rather glaring, point about the social security system as a whole. How did it come to the stage where our elderly, having worked their entire lives, find themselves unable to retire with peace of mind?

In fact, those currently in retirement in Singapore have been struggling all these years to make ends meet. Many have suffered greatly and needlessly because the Government have neglected them.

Madam Lu Dai Hao, a 95-year-old former Samsui woman and someone who worked all her life, fell ill and could not afford her medical expenses. As she did not want to financially burden her daughter, she felt that it was better to take her own life. This shocked Singaporeans even though the plight of people like Madam Lu is not uncommon.

Madam Lu’s death was a serious indictment of the present system. Singaporeans must ask why the plight of our elderly poor must deteriorate to such an extent before the Government is willing to take action. And even then, the PGP does not go far enough to enable our elderly to survive in retirement, it does not address the wider problem of those in need.

If the Government is sincere about ensuring that retirees and the elderly are taken care of, it must review the social security system, not just introduce stop-gap measures like the PGP. It should start with the release of our CPF money currently withheld under the Minimum Sum Scheme. Our retirees depend on these hard-earned savings.

The SDP has laid out our National Healthcare Plan to tackle the medical needs of the elderly and we will address the issue of funding our retirees in our forthcoming policy paper on the economy.

Singapore Democrats

Source: YourSDP.org

The 2014 Budget remains much like last year’s, with more generous topping up of perks. Nonetheless the Singapore People’s Party (SPP) is encouraged to hear about the Pioneer Generation Package. The hard work of the older generations in building up modern Singapore is finally being recognised. This recognition is long overdue. The SPP looks forward to the details that the government is expected to unveil later.

Going beyond GST vouchers

There is nothing new with the GST vouchers – we have them almost every year. While this is a good initiative, the SPP feels that at this point in the evolution of the socio-economic needs of Singaporeans, the government must take a step to go beyond subsidies and small-scale redistribution of money.

Instead the SPP feels that it is the government’s accountability to its people must be based on the following indicators:

• the percentage of Singaporeans employed in newly created jobs;
• the median pay of Singaporeans versus our foreign counterparts;
• what incentives are in place to motivate companies to help meet the indicators above.

Going beyond acronyms

Every year, the government introduces many new initiatives that are accompanied by a slew of acronyms. This year, there is “iSPRINT”, “IPG” and many more interesting names. Besides them being easy to remember, these names need to go beyond that. We need to look closely and examine the follow-through of these initiatives. We need to know if they have been successful or not in terms of what they set our to achieve. We cannot coin new acronyms annually on to be forgotten in the end.

For example, a few months ago, it was announced that more than $400 million was to be set aside for the Future of Manufacturing initiative. The SPP would like to know what is the outcome of such exciting initiatives rather than to see new initiatives being introduced.

Singapore vs the world: how advanced are we actually?

The Finance Minister raised the example of the success of the online tailoring company, Marcella. We applaud Marcella’s successful business model. But in reality, online tailoring businesses, and other interesting retail ideas, are not new and unique to Singapore. Many countries with an even more innovative and competitive retail sector have already developed such business ideas at least 5 to 7 years ago.[1]

What we like to stress is that Singapore needs more substantial and substantive innovation breakthroughs to eventually match the capabilities in other advanced economies. We may even have to take the hard decision to change our mindsets and restructure our economy to become more robust and dynamic to compete in today’s world.

This brings us to the idea of how we need to urgently address the concerns and worries of Singaporeans today.

Our vision: Look further ahead to meet Singaporeans’ needs today

Solving the issues Singaporeans are now grappling with – finding jobs, dealing with the high cost of living, overcrowding – boil down to one thing, economic transformation.

Budget 2014 does not address this elephant in the room – how does Singapore transform itself economically and socially in order to survive the next 50 years? The Finance Minister assumes that some economic sectors can transform themselves effectively, away from an over-reliance on cheap labour. This does not seem to be the case.

Our suggestion would be for Singapore to encourage more productive, innovative and cutting edge foreign companies to come in to collaborate and encourage local companies to build up our productivity through competition. There will then be limited growth for companies that are overly reliant on low wage foreign labour. We have a few of these companies in the marine industry, for instance.

To dream of a Singapore that will last beyond the next 50 years, we need to build on what we always had – our human capital. We need to continue to invest in our people and educate them for the future. Our education system has to be robust and dynamic to meet the challenges ahead.

The SPP’s Policy Group will continue to look at the Budget, especially the rolling out of the Pioneer Generation Package. Our NCMP Mrs Lina Chiam will be making our fuller response to Budget 2014 in Parliament next week, and after the details of the Budget are explained further during the Committee of Supply debate.

LOKE HOE YEONG

Asst Secretary-General,

Singapore People’s Party (SPP)

I totally agree with "Petulant Child" in her article ('Why I am unsupporting the Workers’ Party').

In fact, I think she does not go far enough. The WP has utterly failed my expectations. In the future, I will only cast my vote to any opposition MP who meets these criteria:

1) Willing to serve - Don't care about backlash on career, personal or family reputation 

I don't understand why good calibre people are afraid to serve as opposition MPs. Yah .. your career will be affected - if you are in the public or GLC sector, you can say goodbye to any promotions. Chen She Mao was dropped as a director of SMU after he openly joined the opposition. Your personal reputation will be dragged through the mud - Vincent Vijeysingha was publicly outed by Vivian Bala. Your family may kneel down and beg you not to go down this path.

But hey, I take it for granted that if you truly love the country, none of these are too small a sacrifice.

2) Excellent debater, sharp, quick-thinking, very thick-skin : 

I want someone who can be like we bloggers. Everyday there's some news, we will jump on it and criticise. I want someone like that - everyday criticising. I know that Parliament convenes only once a month, and there is a protocol to follow. I DON'T CARE!! If MRT breaks down, I want my MP to blare about it. If a Casey incident flares up, I want my MP to blare about it. Then and only then, will I say that he is earning his keeps. 

And I don't care about Parliamentary protocols. Ng Eng Huat asked the Education Minister about foreign students grants and essentially the Minister gave him a non-answer. My opposition MP must then jump in and reply and tear the Minister apart. I don't give a damn whether or not it is his turn to speak, or that the Speaker did not allot him time. It does not matter. This is what I mean by thick-skinned. 

And I also don't care if the ST or Mediacorp does not give any publicity about the questions or speeches he makes. It is my opposition MP's responsibility to feed me with the news. It is not my responsibility to followup on Facebook to read his speeches. I want to be spoon-fed -- it is my right as a citizen!!!

3) Must be someone solid on the ground :  

Oh .. on top of being a good debater, skilled PR, blogger .. he must also have good contact on the ground lah. After all, most Singaporeans don't follow the news as closely as netizens. So he must go round to each HDB blocks, every weekend to meet the people. Otherwise, people will say he only knows how to talk, or he only knows how to make policies online but don't know how to work the ground. 

4) Must know how to run a town council :  

He must know how to run a town council. Everyone knows that PAP will play dirty - the minute PAP loses, no cleaning service company in town will be willing to tender to clean the opposition's GRC because if they do that, PAP will sever all ties with that company. So this person must be as good as LTK - in other words, have his own connections to pull a ready team of cleaners to do the work overnight. Otherwise, the people will say - eh, you take over the ward, how come the place so dirty ??

5) Not only know how to run a town council, he must be a super-accountant, a qualified CPA :

Not only must he know how to run a town council immediately after the elections, he must also be able to keep the accounts clean too. I don't care if PAP sells the software to a $2 company like AIM -- I don't care, means I don't care, OK? I don't care if PAP refuses to allow the former auditor to speak to the current auditor. I don't care if PAP leaves no clue about how the opening balances arise and what the details are.

In financial accounting, software enterprise migration is normally a major undertaking. It typically takes 9 months to 1 year to get a transition and even then hitches occur.

I don't care about all these. He must be able to do it overnight. He must be able to magically understand the details of all the things PAP is witholding from him. KBW said that any off the shelf software can be used - and I belive him. (Incidentally KBW said he paid $8 for his heart surgery and I also believe him. And KBW said that actually, 6.9million people can still be a very comfortable place to live if you plan in advance for it, and I also believe him. And when KBW was health minister, he said that never again will a shortage of beds in public hospitals occur and I also believe him).  

6) Every member of his team must be of the same high calibre. 

I know that when it comes to PAP, nobody gives a damn about what Tin Pei Ling says. Or that Raymond Lim has not even opened his mouth even once since GE2011 in Parliament. That's PAP. 

When it comes to the opposition, I want everyone to be of high calibre and meet the requirements (1) to (5) that I spelt out above. I don't care that each person has his own personalities - some are introverts, some are extroverts, some are comfortable in chinese, some in English. If I can be a blogger and make noise on the Internet everyday, I want my MPs to be as vocal too. If I can do it, why can't they ? 

7) The party must be willing and able to take over and run the country immediately :

I don't want that party to say he'll be a "co-driver" - I hate that word. I don't want that party to say they're not ready to form the next govt - if you're not ready, then please get out of my elitist face. 

I don't care that none of them have governing experience. I don't care that most of them have not learnt to work together as a team, because the GE is suddenly called and they're chosen as candidates at the last minute. All these inconvenient facts do not matter to me.

I WANT THEM TO SAY THEY ARE READY TO FORM THE NEXT GOVT - just say it lah!! And please have a good answer ready, when the PAP then ask you - so, who will be Finance minister? And whoever you said will be the Finance minister, will then have his background scrutinized upside down. Please make sure your background meets all the criteria (1) to (6) above, and at the same time, you've very senior level experience managing a company. 

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Phew ... er .. Petulant child .. how about you and I form a political party to contest in GE2015 ??? Shall we start our block visit this Saturday? Where you want to go? Lets have a nasi padang first, before that, OK? I heard there's a stall in Tampines, very cheap, cost only $2.50 one. 

JG

TRS Contributor